GIFT  OF 


The  Kantian  Epistemology 
and     ^heism. 


A  DISSERTATION  PRESENTED  TO  THE  FACULTY  OF 
/PRINCETON  COLLEGE  FOR  THE  DEGREH 
OF  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY, 


c    WISTAR  HODGK,  JR. 


he  Theism  reprinted  from  "  Trie  Presbyterian  and  Reformed 
Review"  of  July,  1894. 


PHILADELPHIA  : 
MACCALLA  &  COMPANY,  237-9  DOCK  STREET, 

—1894— 


The  Kantian  Epistemology 
and      heism. 


A  DISSERTATION  PRESENTED  TO  THE  FACULTY  OF 

PRINCETON  COLLEGE  FOR  THE  DEGREE 

OF  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY, 


C.   WISTAR  HODQE,  JR. 


The  Theism  reprinted  from  "  Trie  Presbyterian  and  Reformed 
Review"  of  July,  1894. 


PHILADELPHIA  : 

MACCALLA  &  COMPANY,  237-9  DOCK  STREET, 
—1894— 


/3.27S? 


frr 


The  Kantian  Epistemology  and  Theism. 


METAPHYSICS  is  the  most  human  of  all  departments  of 
knowledge.  This  can  be  seen  from  the  fact  that  the  first 
question  of  unreflective  thought  is  the  same  as  that  which  holds  the 
chief  place  in  philosophic  reflection.  Man  looks  within  and  with- 
out himself,  upon  his  own  thoughts  and  passions  which  come  and 
go,  out  upon  the  phenomena  of  nature,  and  the  question  which  comes 
nearest  to  the  mind  and  heart  of  all  is,  What  is  real  ?  Where  are 
we  to  find  the  ground  of  phenomena  ?  Eeality  there  surely  is,  or  else 
all  philosophy  would  be  vain.  This  is  the  great  intuition  of  which 
the  consciousness  of  every  age  is  heir ;  but  where  is  ultimate  Eeality 
to  be  found,  and  what  is  its  nature  ?  Such  questions,  from  their  very 
nature,  are  the  first  to  suggest  themselves  to  man,  and  when  once 
he  has  consciously  reflected  upon  them  he  becomes  aware  that  not 
only  are  they  logically  and  temporally  the  first  questions  for  human- 
ity, but  that  from  the  standpoint  of  worth  for  the  human  spirit, 
Metaphysics  is  that  which  man  as  a  rational  being  must  have. 
While  humanity  exists  and  strives,  hopes  and  despairs,  rejoices  and 
sorrows,  its  own  soul  with  its  hope  of  immortality  and  belief  in  its 
freedom  and  responsibility,  the  world  about  it,  and  the  God  above 
must  always  be  the  questions  of  the  greatest  worth,  and  these  are 
the  questions  of  Metaphysics. 

But  while  we  reflect  upon  Being  or  Eeality,  its  idea  has  been  a 
part  of  our  conscious  experience,  and  were  this  not  so  we  could  not 
have  reflected  upon  it.  By  the  idea  of  the  Eeal  then  alone  can  we 
solve  our  problems.  Now  the  idea  or  conscious  experience  of  Eeal- 
ity is  knowledge,  so  that  the  problem  of  knowledge  is  inseparable 
from  that  of  Being.  The  first  question,  then,  which  reflective 
thought  puts  itself  as  it  proceeds  to  the  solution  of  its  fundamental 
problem  is  this, — Is  knowledge  possible  ? — and  of  course,  the  next 
question  is, — If  possible,  how  ?  In  seeking  an  answer  to  these  two 
questions  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  knowledge  has  been  defined 
as  the  idea,  that  is,  the  mind's  grasp  of  Eeality,  so  that  any  answer 
which  makes  knowledge  anything  less  than  this  must  be  rejected. 
The  first  question  was  as  to  whether  or  not  knowledge  is  possible 

239445 


Now  we  will  find  that  Kant's  answer  to  the  second  question,  as  to 
how  knowledge  is  possible,  shows  that  we  can't  give  a  demonstra- 
tive answer  to  this  question ;  but  if  we  assume  that  knowledge  is 
possible,  then  the  answer  to  the  question  how  it  is  possible  will  lead 
to  a  result  which  will  justify  our  assumption  of  its  possibility. 

Kant  has  shown  that  no  uncritical  demonstration  of  the  possibil- 
ity of  knowledge  is  possible.  He  was  born  in  an  age  when  two 
solutions  of  the  problem  of  knowledge  had  been  given,  and  both 
had  reduced  the  organic  process  of  experience  to  a  mechanical  basis. 

The  Kational  Movement,  beginning  with  DesCartes  and  ending 
with  Wolff,  had,  though  in  a  somewhat  different  way  in  each  of  its 
representatives,  postulated  a  parallelism  between  thought  and  Be- 
ing ;  and  in  Wolff  the  whole  of  knowing  had  been  reduced  to  the 
making  explicit  those  ideas  which  were  already  implicit  in  our  con- 
cepts, thus  overlooking  the  real  question  of  how  the  individual 
mind  can  go  outside  itself  and  lay  hold  on  Keality.  Such  purely 
analytic  judgments  as  are  yielded  by  such  a  method,  says  Kant,  are 
subjectively  necessary  but  do  not  increase  our  knowledge,  for  the 
question  is, — How  can  we  obtain  objectivity  and  synthesis?  Kant 
then  breaks  away  from  the  formalism  of  Wolff  and  turns  his  atten- 
tion to  the  Empirical  school  of  Locke  and  Hume.  His,  though,  is 
too  great  a  mind  to  rest  long  in  such  a  philosophy,  and  he  shows 
plainly  its  weaknesses. 

Mechanism  reigns  supreme  here.  The  mind  is  a  blank,  the 
objects  of  knowledge  are  totally  unrelated  to  and  different  from 
mind.  They  come  into  contact  with  our  organs  of  sense  and  set  up 
nervous  excitations  which,  by  some  mysterious  transformation,  be- 
come conscious  impressions,  or  rather  impressions  of  which  we  are 
conscious.  But  an  impression  is  merely  subjective.  We  cannot 
say  that  it  has  any  objective  reference,  if  our  sole  source  of  infor- 
mation be  our  senses.  Here,  then,  is  a  purely  subjective  fact,  but 
there  seem  to  be  certain  necessary  connections  between  these  impres- 
sions, and  Hume  saw  that  this  necessity  was  the  point  for  which  he 
must  give  an  account  on  his  own  premises ;  but  he  explained  it  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  explain  it  away  altogether.  Such  relations  as 
identity  and  causality  he  reduced  to  subjective  habits  resulting  from 
association,  so  that,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  in  turning  to  the  senses 
for  objectivity,  we  end  in  a  world  of  illusion,  impressions  coming 
and  going,  related  to  we  know  not  what,  their  connections  with  one 
another  being  merely  the  result  of  habitual  association.  It  is  easy 
to  see  that  knowledge  has  been  rendered  absolutely  impossible,  that 
we  can  no  more  assert  the  existence  of  matter  than  of  mind,  and 
that  the  most  thorough  skepticism  must  be  the  outcome  of  a 
mechanical  and  sensational  Empiricism. 


We  cannot,  then,  from  the  contact  of  the  objects  of  knowledge 
with  our  sense  organs,  nor  by  the  analysis  of  our  concepts,  demon- 
strate the  possibility  of  knowledge,  that  is,  we  cannot  thus  prove 
that  our  knowledge  is  real  and  objective,  so  that  we  must  approach 
the  problem  in  a  different  way.  We  must  first  ask  the  Kantian 
question  how  knowledge  is  possible,  and  the  result  will  justify  our 
assumption  of  its  reality,  that  is,  its  possibility.  How,  then,  is  syn- 
thesis possible  ?  How  are  judgments  possible  which  are  necessary 
and  a  priori,  and  at  the  same  time  synthetic  and  not  merely  ana- 
lytic ? 

Two  presuppositions  are  necessary.  The  first  has  been  the 
great  constructive  work  of  Kant.  It  is  the  activity  of  mind. 
Mathematical  science  seems  certain,  and  yet  must  fall  if  Hume  gives 
the  last  word  for  philosophy.  For  mathematical  judgments  are 
synthetic  and  a  priori.  Judgments  of  geometry,  while  a  priori, 
rest  not  on  the  analysis  of  concepts,  but  on  the  construction  of  a 
priori  intuition  by  the  productive  imagination.  So  also  is  the  case 
where  time  is  involved  instead  of  space.  If,  then,  mathematical  sci- 
ence be  possible,  Kant  says  that  space  and  time  must  not  be  things 
or  qualities  of  things,  but  forms  of  the  mind,  pure  a  priori  intui- 
tions. But  if  we  advance  further  we  will  find  that  space  and  time 
are  only  forms  for  the  possibility  of  the  cognition  of  objects,  and 
that  with  these  alone  we  cannot  refer  our  impressions  to  one  object, 
nor  can  we  cognize  one  object  out  of  its  relations  in  the  context  of 
our  organic  experience.  We  know  objects  only  as  a  part  of  what 
we  understand  as  nature  with  its  necessary  connections.  Every, 
thing,  then,  must  be  cognized  as  necessary  in  its  connections  with 
the  other  objects  of  our  conscious  experience,  and  thus,  according 
to  Kant,  impressions  are  referred  a  priori  to  objects,  and  objects  are 
cognized  in  necessary  relations  with  each  other.  The  categories 
accomplish  this.  In  the  deduction  of  these  we  come  to  the  great 
lesson  to  be  learned  from  Kant.  His  deduction  of  the  categories  * 
is  substantially  this :  The  conjunction  of  the  manifold  in  an  intui- 
tion can  never  be  given  by  the  senses.  Neither  is  it  contained  in  the 
form  of  pure  intuition.  It  is  given  by  the  understanding  in  an  act 
called  synthesis.  But  the  conception  of  a  conjunction  of  the  manifold 
includes  that  of  unity,  for  conjunction  is  the  unity  of  the  manifold 
of  sense,  so  that  this  synthetic  unity  renders  conjunction  possible. 

Now  this  is  not  the  category  of  unity  because  all  the  categories 
presuppose  this  original  act  of  synthesis.  This  is  the  original  activ- 
ity of  mind  which  has  been  laid  down  as  one  of  the  presuppositions 
necessary  to  knowledge.  The  "  I  think  "  is  the  synthesis  of  all  im- 
pressions into  one  self- consciousness.  It  is  that  which  gives  objec- 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  chap,  ii,  sec.  2. 


6 

tivity  to  our  judgments.  It  is  that  which  illumines  all  things  with 
the  clear  light  of  self- consciousness.  To  this  unity  all  representa- 
tions and  impressions  are  to  be  related,  and  the  media  are  the  cate- 
gories, hence  their  deduction,  that  is  their  justification  as  necessary 
elements  in  knowledge,  is  the  fact  that  they  are  links  to  self- con- 
sciousness. Things,  then,  if  there  be  such,  which  are  not  related  to 
this  objectifying  self-consciousness,  can  never  be  known.  For  a 
theory  of  knowledge  the  first  and  last  word  must  be  self- conscious- 
ness. As  Leibnitz  *  says,  "  there  is  a  light  born  within  us."  There 
has  been  too  much  criticism  of  Kant  which  seeks  to  make  him  a 
Berkeley  an  idealist  because  he  taught  philosophy  the  great  truth 
that  things  exist  only  in  relation  to  self-consciousness.  Such 
criticism  fails  to  recognize  the  difference  between  psychological  and 
transcendental  idealism.  Psychological  idealism  reduces  everything 
to  a  dream  of  the  individual  mind,  while  transcendental  idealism 
shows  those  universal  rational  principles  which  bind  the  mind  to 
reality.  Moreover  criticism  such  as  this  does  not  realize  the  fact 
that  Kant's  great  mistakes  do  not  follow  from  this  his  great  truth, 
but  because  he  failed  to  recognize  the  fact  that  a  second  postulate 
necessary  to  knowledge, — that  the  real  is  rational, — is  deducible  and 
follows  necessarily  from  this  first  truth.  This  we  shall  endeavor  to 
show,  and  it  is  here  that  criticism  should  meet  Kantism.  Because 
all  things  exist  in  relation  to  self- consciousness,  Kant's  individualistic 
and  sensationalistic  presuppositions  by  no  means  follow.  Critics 
therefore  should  praise  him  for  his  great  lesson  to  philosophy. 

But  there  is  a  second  presupposition  without  which  knowledge  as 
here  defined  is  impossible.  It  is  that  the  real  is  rational.  This  is 
not  to  be  confused  with  the  assertion  that  the  rational  is  the  real, 
which  is  very  different.  That  the  real  is  rational,  however,  is  essen- 
tial for  knowledge.  If  we  discover  self- consciousness  with  its 
activity  and  its  categories,  and  then  say  that  they  are  individual  and 
human  merely,  differing  from  that  which  is  universal,  then  that 
which  was  to  give  us  reality  and  objectivity  shuts  us  off  from  it, 
and  we  come  to  suppose  that  the  real  is  beyond  us ;  that  the  world 
is  dead  matter  which  in  some  way  causes  impressions,  that  is,  that 
it  is  noumenon  in  the  negative  sense  of  the  term  as  that  which  is 
not  the  object  of  our  sensuous  intuition,  and  that  noumena  in  the 
positive  sense  as  objects  of  non- sensuous  intuition  are  separated  from 
us  and  out  of  all  relation,  not  knowable  because  not  mechanically 
known.  The  real  must  be  rational,  and  the  true  nature  of  self-con- 
sciousness and  knowledge  must  be  recognized.  If  Kant's  great 

*  Leibnitz,  On  the  Supersensuous  Element  in  Knowledge  and  On  the  Immaterial 
in  Nature.  A  letter  to  Queen  Charlotte  of  Prussia,  1702.  Vol.  of  translations  of 
the  Philosophical  works  of  Leibnitz  by  G.  Duncan. 


lesson,  that  things  exist  only  in  relation  to  self-consciousness,  be 
true,  and  if  self- consciousness  be  an  activity  and  hence  a  real  ele- 
ment in  Being,  then  this  second  postulate  follows  necessarily  from 
the  first,  so  that  if  we  follow  logically  Kant's  own  principle  and  the 
spirit  of  his  system,  we  will  reach  a  different  conclusion  than  that 
which  he  did.  The  causes  of  his  failure  to  take  this  farther  step 
can  be  traced  to  the  fact  that  he  accepted  the  presuppositions  of  the 
very  school  he  was  endeavoring  to  refute  and  against  which  the  whole 
spirit  of  his  teaching  points.  After  having  shown  that  objects  can- 
not exist  out  of  relation  to  self- consciousness,  Kant  presupposes  that 
knowledge  is  a  mechanical  process,  the  putting  together  of  factors 
which  are  separate,  hence  he  must  choose  which  of  his  two  factors 
is  the  real  one,  and  he  turns  round  in  contradiction  to  his  own 
teaching  and  says  that  the  real  is  that  which  affects  our  senses,  so 
that  the  next  step  is  to  say  that  self-consciousness  as  known  is  a 
mere  phenomenon  of  the  internal  sense,  and  that  the  synthetic  unity 
of  self- consciousness  is  only  a  logical  notion.  Then  of  course  the 
breach  can  never  be  healed,  all  the  work  of  mind  is  individual  and 
subjective,  the  impression  of  sense,  which  he  has  really  shown  cannot 
exist,  is  the  only  source  from  which  the  mental  forms  can  have  con- 
tent, so  that  the  real  world  lies  as  a  sphere  of  dead  "  things  in 
themselves  "  which  are  unrelated  to  thought,  noumena  in  the  nega- 
tive sense  as  already  explained,  while  noumena  in  the  positive  sense 
are  beyond  even  the  possibility  of  the  assertion  of  their  existence. 
Against  this  is  the  whole  spirit  of  Kant's  teaching  as  to  the  activity 
of  mind,  for  if  self-consciousness  is  a  spiritual  activity  how  can  it  be 
unreal  ?  We  are  lead  by  Kant's  own  teaching  on  this  first  point  to 
accept  the  second  presupposition  essential  for  knowledge,  that  the 
real  is  rational. 

Not  only  is  the  spirit  of  the  whole  Critique  against  the  assump- 
tions which  hold  Kant  back,  but  also  it  is  opposed  to  their  bad 
fruits  at  every  stage  in  the  discussion.  If  the  whole  idea  of  the 
Critique  is  that  things  exist  only  in  relation  to  self- consciousness 
then  there  is  always  an  original  synthesis  previous  to  all  analysis, 
so  that  knowledge  may  have  a  universal  and  a  particular  aspect, 
but  in  reality  the  two  are  one.  Knowledge  is  an  organic  process 
and  not  a  mechanical  one,  and  the  impression  of  sense  which  Kant 
got  from  Hume,  so  far  from  being  the  real  element  in  knowledge, 
does  not  exist  at  all  for  consciousness,  and  things  are  only  known  as 
parts  of  an  organic  system.  Hence  in  following  the  spirit  of  Kant's 
teaching  we  should  do  away  with  these  false  presuppositions.  At 
every  step  moreover  are  the  bad  results  of  these  assumptions  con- 
trary to  the  spirit  of  his  teaching.  Of  course  we  cannot  follow  this 
out  in  detail,  but  will  choose  two  points,  which  are  of  special  im- 


8 

portance  in  relation  to  Theism,  to  show  how  the  letter  contradicts 
the  spirit  in  Kant,  and  how  if  we  admit  the  necessity  for  the  mind's 
activity,  we  are  lead  into  contradictions  if  we  deny  its  universality 
and  reality,  that  is  that  the  real  is  rational.  The  first  and  most  im- 
portant point  in  a  theory  of  knowledge  is,  as  we  have  seen,  self- 
consciousness.  Now  the  real  is  rational  here,  knowing  and  being  meet 
at  this  point.  Self- consciousness  is  objective  consciousness.  "We 
have  seen  how  Kant's  presuppositions  lead  him  to  overlook  this. 
But  if  it  is  an  activity  how  can  it  be  a  mere  logical  notion  ?  Let  us 
examine  its  true  nature,  and  study  a  little  more  closely  this,  Kant's 
fundamental  mistake. 

If  knowledge  is  to  be  ontological  there  must  be  some  point  where 
knowing  and  being  meet.  This  point  is  objective  self- consciousness. 
But  Kant  argues  that  as  knowledge  is  a  process  in  which  the  con- 
tent of  the  categories  must  be  given  *by  sense  intuition,  hence  the 
only  reality  for  knowledge  is  that  which  impresses  the  inner  or 
outer  sense,  so  that  Being  is  out  of  relation  to  our  faculties,  and 
hence  all  our  knowledge  is  phenomenal.  But  he  saw  that  the  cate- 
gories must  belong,  to  some  subject  other  than  the  empirical  self  of 
the  inner  sense  which  they  determine,  but  the  metempirical  self  is 
an  empty  idea.  Thus  he  argues,*  with  reference  to  the  "  possibility 
of  a  conjunction  of  the  manifold  representations  given  in  sense  " 
that  the  presupposition  of  all  is  "  the  original  synthetic  unity  of 
apperception."  This  is  an  admission  of  the  "cogito  ergo  sum"  of 
DesCartes,  only  that  Kant  makes  it  an  empty  idea  because  it  can't 
be  presented  to  the  inner  sense.  Thus  under  the  "  Paralogism  of 
Pure  Eeason  "  f  we  find  him  saying,  "  If  this  conception  is  to  indi- 
cate by  the  term  substance,  an  object  that  can  be  given,  if  it  is  to 
become  a  cognition,  we  must  have  at  the  basis  of  the  cognition  a 
permanent  intuition  as  the  indispensable  condition  of  its  objective 
reality."  In  other  words,  the  only  substance  is  that  which  is  object 
only,  and  that  too  to  sense,  so  that  as  the  inner  sense  only  gives  my 
phenomenal  self,  that  is,  my  flowing  states  of  consciousness,  of 
course  the  Ego  is  a  mere  necessity  of  conception.  If  he  had  real- 
ized that  the  real  is  rational,  that  the  Ego  is  real  because  it  acts  and 
thinks,  he  would  have  been  saved  his  mistake.  There  is  no  contra- 
diction between  Idealism  and  Eealism  when  the  terms  are  properly 
used.  Prof.  Morris  says  ^  that  we  must  accept  Kant's  conclusion  as 
to  the  Ego  if  we  accept  his  presupposition  that  an  object  of  knowl- 
edge can  be  given  only  by  sense.  If  the  mechanical  relation 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  "Deduction  of 
the  Categories." 

fKant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  u.  244. 

\  Morris,  A  Critique  of  Kant,  chap,  on  "The  Paralogism  of  Pure  Reason." 


9 

"between  subject  and  object  be  maintained,  then  subject  and  object 
can  only  be  conceived  as  opposites ;  whatever  is  purely  and  abso- 
lutely objective  can  never  be  subjective  and  vice  versa.  Therefore, 
€#  hypothesi^  the  absolute  subject  can  never  become  object.  But  if 
we  realize  the  truth  that  the  I  is  conscious  of  itself  only  as  exist- 
ing, then  there  is  seen  to  be  a  vital  connection  between  thought 
and  being.  Being  is  in  closest  relation  with  my  conscious  life,  and 
we  need  not  presuppose  a  thing  in  itself  out  of  all  relation  to  my 
faculties.  But  as  this  is  so  vital  a  point  in  a  theory  of  knowledge, 
the  exact  relation  of  the  "  cogito  "  and  the  "  sum  "  should  be  deter- 
mined. What  then  is  the  relation  between  the  thought  and  the  I  ? 
In  the  first  place,  those  who  have  criticised  the  "  cogito  ergo  sum  " 
as  a  piece  of  syllogistic  reasoning  have  missed  the  point.  Then 
the  major,  to  use  the  language  of  Prof.  Veitch,*  would  be  the 
abstract  proposition,  "  thinking  is  existing,"  and  this,  Prof.  Veitch 
says,  is  erroneously  to  suppose  a  purely  abstract  beginning  for 
thought,  for  "  if  I  am  able  to  say,  I  am  conscious  that  all  thinking 
is  existing,  the  guarantee  even  of  this  major  or  universal  is  the  par- 
ticular affirmation  of  my  being  conscious  of  its  truth  in  a  given 
time ;  if  I  am  not  able  to  say  this,  then  I  cannot  assert  that  all 
thinking  is  existing,  or  indeed  assert  anything  at  all."  But,  as 
Prof.  Veitch  shows,  it  is  an  immediate  inference,  or,  more  correctly, 
I  think,  it  is  an  act  of  direct  consciousness,  so  that  Huxley's  objec- 
tion that  the  "  I  am  "  is  assumed  in  the  "  I  think  "  will  not  hold. 
Let  me  quote  Prof.  Veitch f  again:  "'That  something  called  I 
exists,'  is  not  known  to  me  before  I  am  conscious,  but  only  as  I  am 
conscious.  It  is  not  a  distinct  proposition.  'Something  called 
thought  exists '  is  not  any  more  a  distinct  proposition,  for  the 
thought  which  exists  is  inseparably  my  thought,  and  my  thought 
is  more  than  the  mere  abstraction  *  thought.'  '  The  thought  is  the 
result  of  the  action  of  the  I '  is  not  a  fair  statement  of  the  relation 
between  the  '  I '  and  the  *  thought,'  for  there  is  no  *  I '  known  first 
and  distinct  from  thought,  to  whose  action  I  can  ascribe  thought. 
The  thought  is  me  thinking.  .  And  the  existence  of  the  thought 
would  never  be  absolutely  indubitable  to  me  unless  it  were  my 
thought,  for  if  it  be  but  thought,  this  is  an  abstraction  with  which 
I  have  and  can  have  no  relation.  '  How  do  you  know  that  thought 
is  not  self-existent  ?  '  that  is  divorced  from  a  me  or  thinker,  for  this 
reason,  simply  that  such  a  thought  could  never  be  mine,  or  aught 
to  me  or  my  knowledge.  Thought  divorced  from  a  thinker  would 
be  not  so  much  an  absurdity  as  a  nullity."  The  significance  of  this 

*  Veitch,  "Introduction  to  DesCartes,"  published  in  Veitch 's  translation  of 
DesCartes'  Discourse  on  Method  and  Meditations. 
f  Veitch,  "Introduction  to  DesCartes." 


10 

for  Philosophy  is  very  plain.  It  is  this :  In  the  very  first  act  of 
knowledge  there  is  a  necessary  and  vital  connection  between  know- 
ing and  being  within  our  consciousness.  They  imply  each  other. 
Hence  Eeality  is  spiritual,  and  there  is  no  ground  for  the  positing 
of  lifeless  "  things  in  themselves  "  which  can  never  be  known,  and 
no  more  ground  is  there  for  regarding  as  unreal  that  which  we  do 
know.  Thought  and  being  are  thus  together  from  the  very  first, 
and  Kant's  doctrine  of  the  synthetic  unity  of  apperception  is  wrong. 
But  there  is  another  lesson  quite  as  important  for  Philosophy  taught 
us  here.  We  learn  that  all  consciousness  is  personal  consciousness. 
The  two  are  inseparable,  and  there  is  no  such  thing  as  conscious- 
ness in  the  abstract.  Existence  is  personal  conscious  existence.  It 
is  to  the  greatest  degree  concrete.  There  is  no  such  thing  as  pure, 
unconscious,  qualityless  being,  coming  bj  a  necessary  evolution  to 
be  clothed  upon  with  concreteness.  Philosophy  must  start  with 
Being  as  known  in  our  self -consciousness,  otherwise  we  cannot  know 
the  nature  of  Being,  and  we  cannot  evolve  it  by  any  extra  conscious 
way.  We  do  not  wish  to  be  misunderstood  here.  For  while  the 
very  point  of  our  criticism  of  Kant  is  that  he  never  transcends 
individual  human  consciousness,  we  still  believe  that  Dr.  Caird  *  is 
mistaken  when  he  says  that  if  we  take  our  stand  in  individual  con- 
sciousness we  can  never  transcend  it.  On  the  contrary,  the  truth  is 
this,  that  if  we  do  not  start  with  our  self- consciousness  we  can  never 
know  the  nature  of  Eeality.  If,  however,  we  do  thus  start,  we  find 
principles  which  have  a  necessity  which  must  come  from  a  source 
above  our  individual  consciousness,  showing  that  it  is  in  harmony 
with  Universal  Consciousness. 

We  must  give  only  a  very  brief  space  in  showing  the  contradic- 
tions involved  in  denying  that  the  real  is  rational  in  the  case  of 
space  and  time,  that  is  knowledge  in  the  sphere  of  perception,  and 
pass  on  to  Kant's  doctrine  of  causality  as  being  of  special  import- 
ance in  relation  to  Theism,  and  furnishing  a  general  example  of  the 
categories. 

As  to  space  and  time.  The  difficulties  at  this  part  of  Kant's  dis- 
cussion spring  from  the  same  source.  The  critical  position  in  the 
"  Analytic  "  is  that  objects  exist  only  in  relation  to  self- conscious- 
ness and  in  relation  to  each  other.  In  the  "  ^Esthetic,"  however, 
Kant  seems  to  hold  it  possible  that  objects  be  given  and  the  intelli- 
gible or  intellectual  relations  added  afterwards.  Hence  that  which 
is  a  priori  must  be  merely  subjective,  and  if  anything  is  objective  it 
must  be  a  "  thing  "  or  a  "  quality  of  a  thing  "  given  by  the  senses. 
Now  space  and  time  must  be  a  priori  in  order  that  we  may  have 
synthetic  judgments  a  priori  in  Mathematics,  and  consequently  they 

*  Caird,  The  Philosophy  of  Kant. 


11 

cannot  be  "  things  "  or  "  qualities  of  things,"  and  must  therefore 
be  merely  subjective.  Now  it  seems  almost  needless  to  repeat  that 
all  this  comes  from  the  mere  assumption  that  the  real  is  that  which 
is  given  by  the  senses,  and  that  when  this  assumption  is  done  away 
with,  the  separation  of  a  priori  and  a  posteriori  in  knowledge  van- 
ishes, and  with  it  the  belief  that  that  which  is  a  priori  must  be 
subjective.  We  may  hold  to  the  a  priori  character  of  space  and 
time,  and  at  the  same  time  on  Kantian  principles  show  their  ob- 
jectivity by  recognizing  the  truth  that  objects  must  be  in  space  and 
time  or  they  could  not  exist,  much  less  be  known,  and  that  without 
sensationalistic  presuppositions  there  is  no  reason  for  postulating  any 
other  reality  in  this  sphere.  In  criticising  Kant's  doctrine  of  space 
and  time,  Trendelenburg  *  has  shown  the  entire  compatibility  of 
a  prioriness  and  objectivity,  though  he  destroys  the  original  element 
in  them  by  trying  to  derive  both  from  motion  which,  of  course, 
really  presupposes  both.  In  order  to  illustrate  what  has  been  said 
and  to  show  the  contradiction  involved  in  denying  that  reality  is 
rational  in  reference  to  the  world  in  space  and  time,  we  cannot  do 
better  than  quote  Dr.  Ueberweg  :f  "  The  subjective  element  in 
sense  perception  cannot  be  separated  from  the  objective  in  this  way, 
namely  that  space  and  time  can  be  referred  to  the  subject  only,  or 
its  material  to  external  things  affecting  our  senses.  For  on  this 
presupposition,  although  it  would  be  necessary  to  apprehend  the 
matter  of  sense  perception  in  any  form  of  space  and  time,  each  par- 
ticular matter  would  not  be  referred  back  to  each  particular  form, 
and  consequently  might  be  perceived  in  another  form  from  that  in 
which  it  actually  appears,  without  having  undergone  any  real 
change.  But  in  perception  we  feel  ourselves  actually  confined  to 
the  union  of  definite  forms  with  definite  matters."  Similar  also  is 
the  position  of  Herbart.^:  Here,  then,  is  a  confirmation  of  the  neces- 
sity of  recognizing  the  second  presupposition  as  stated,  and  a  clear 
view  of  the  difficulties  involved  in  its  denial. 

The  categories  come  next.  They  are  a  part  of  the  mind's  syn- 
thetic activity,  the  first  presupposition  necessary  for  knowledge,  so 
ably  expounded  by  Kant.  Their  function  in  knowledge,  as  he  sets 
it  forth,  has  been  stated.  But  we  have  now  to  look  at  the  contra- 
dictions involved  in  denying  that  the  real  is  rational,  that  Eeason  is 
Ontologic.  Kant's  only  ground  for  asserting  the  individual  and 
subjective  character  of  the  categories  is  a  contradiction.  Impressions 
of  sense  are  unreal.  The  forms  of  sensibility  are  only  potentialities, 
so  that  the  categories  are  necessary  to  give  reality  to  knowledge. 

*  Trendelenburg,  Logische  Untersuchungen,  §  6. 

f  Ueberweg,  Logic,  p.  80. 

$  Ueberweg,  History  of  Philosophy,  Vol.  ii,  p.  271. 


1 


12 

Such  is  the  first  position  taken  by  Kant,  and  the  next  is  that  knowl- 
edge is  phenomenal  just  because  the  categories  are  necessary,  whence 
a  human  element  is  introduced  producing  subjectivity.  On  such  a 
contradiction  rests  the  doctrine  of  their  subjective  and  phenomenal 
character.  But  it  should  be  observed  that  only  the  necessity  for  the 
categories  is  shown,  not  their  individual  and  subjective  character. 
In  order  to  see  how  untenable  is  the  doctrine  of  the  subjectivity  of 
the  categories,  it  will  be  best  to  take  as  an  example  of  them  that  of 
causality,  as  this  is  most  intimately  connected  with  Theism,  and  it 
will  be  necessary  in  examing  Kant's  Theistic  discussion,  to  know  his 
exact  view  of  causality.  In  his  discussion  of  causality  Kant  is  en- 
deavoring to  answer  Hume.  It  is  necessary  to  notice  that  Kant's 
method  of  dealing  with  the  problem  is  to  first  write  as  though  he 
admitted  the  precritical  position  that  we  have  through  perception 
experience  of  a  series  of  events  while  the  understanding  then  adds 
the  elements  of  universality  and  necessity,  then  later  to  advance  to 
his  own  position  that  the  work  of  the  understanding  itself  is  neces- 
sary to  perception.  Hume  had  seen  that  the  nerve  of  causality  lay 
in  the  necessity  therein  involved.  This  he  had  entirely  explained 
away  by  reducing  it  to  a  mere  subjective  habit  of  association. 
Kant  saw  that  even  granting  that  we  could  have  experience  of  ob- 
jects through  perception  alone,  this  could  give  knowledge  only  of 
matters  of  fact,  but  no  necessity  of  connection.  Granting  that  we 
could  perceive  that  one  event  follows  another,  we  could  never  say 
that  it  must  always  do  so.  If,  then,  this  cannot  be  given  by  percep- 
tion, and  yet  is  a  fact,  as  Hume  admitted  when  he  sought  an  ex- 
planation for  it,  we  must  seek  it  in  the  synthetic  activity  of  thought, 
in  a  concept  of  the  understanding.  But  from  a  concept  we  can 
never  advance  our  knowledge  by  an  analysis  of  its  implicit  content. 
We  must  have  a  proof  that  this  category  can  be  applied  to  real  ob- 
jective sequences.  This  is  given  in  the  proof  of  the  "  Second 
Analogy."*  Kant  is  to  prove  that  "  all  changes  take  place  accord- 
ing to  the  law  of  connection  of  cause  and  effect."  His  proof  in  sub- 
stance is  as  follows :  Mere  experience  of  succession  is  dependent  on 
the  a  priori  judgment  of  causality.  For  in  all  empirical  cognition 
there  is  a  synthesis  of  the  manifold  by  the  productive  imagination, 
but  this  synthesis  may  have  the  events  in  any  order,  either  pro- 
gressively or  retrogressively.  But  in  order  that  it  may  have  objec- 
tive validity  the  events  must  be  represented  as  they  occur  in  time. 
Now  they  occur  in  time  in  a  necessarily  determined  order ;  there- 
fore in  order  that  reality  may  be  given  to  the  sequence,  this  neces- 
sary order  must  be  given  by  the  category  of  causality  determined  in 
time  a  priori  as  invariable  sequence.  The  proof,  then,  consists  in 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pare  Reason,  Meiklejolm's  translation,  p.  141. 


13 

simply  this.  In  the  first  place  we  admittedly  have  subjective 
sequences  of  our  perceptions,  as  in  the  case  of  the  perception  of  a 
house  where  the  sensations  must  be  successive  because  our  conscious- 
ness is  subject  to  time,  but  where  the  order  is  arbitrary.  We  do 
admittedly  experience  objective  sequences  where  the  order  is  not 
arbitrary  but  invariable,  and  just  this  is  their  distinguishing  mark. 
Kant  now  asks  how  this  latter  kind  are  possible.  Not,  he  says,  by 
mere  perception,  since  this  gives  nothing  objective  without  the  un- 
derstanding. Not  from  the  pure  concept  which  can  only  make  ex- 
plicit by  analysis  that  which  a  previous  synthesis  has  given  it,  and 
which  can  never  prove  that  causality  can  be  in  objects.  Experience 
of  this  objective  sequence,  then,  is  possible  only  from  the  fact  that 
we  determine  the  category  of  causality  in  time  as  invariable 
sequence. 

Such  seems  the  meaning  of  this  passage  which  has  aroused  so 
much  discussion  and  about  which  opinions  so  various  have  been 
held.  Adamson*  says  that  Kant  cannot  be  trying  to  show  how 
invariable  sequence  is  possible,  because  he  is  endeavoring  to  prove 
that  all  experience  of  change  is  possible  only  by  means  of  the 
causal  category.  In  order  that  any  change  be  determined  "  as 
existing  in  time"  it  must  be  determined  according  to  the  law  of 
cause  and  effect.  So  Adamson  concludes  that  the  problem  is  to 
show  how  experience  of  any  change  at  all  is  possible.  But  Kant  is 
trying  to  show  that  all  experience  of  real  or  objective  changes,  as 
distinct  from  those  due  to  the  arbitrary  play  of  our  imagination 
and  therefore  subjective,  is  subject  to  the  causal  law;  and  it  is  just 
this  irreversibility  which  is  their  distinguishing  mark,  hence  this 
distinction  is  just  Kant's  point,  so  far  from  leading  to  a  confusion, 
as  Adamson  claims.  Certainly  Kant  is  trying  to  prove  that  all 
changes  in  an  ordered  objective  experience  are  subject  to  this  law, 
and,  as  Adamson  says,  it  would  be  contrary  to  his  whole  position  to 
hold  otherwise;  but  of  course  the  question  is  limited  to  that  coordi- 
nated and  related  experience  which  is  the  sphere  of  knowledge. 
Dr.  Stirling  f  takes  a  different  view,  but  Prof.  "Watson  J  criticises 
Stirling  and  takes  a  position  very  similar  to  the  one  just  stated. 
Dr.  Stirling  says  that  Kant  holds  that  through  perception  we  have 
a  knowledge  of  events  in  sequences  and  then  by  means  of  the 
causal  category  determine  some  as  necessary  and  invariable,  and 
then  Stirling  objects  that  if  there  were  not  some  necessary  order  or 
connection  in  the  events  themselves  we  could  not  know  when  to 

*  Adamson,  The  Philosophy  of  Kant,  Lecture  ii. 

f  Stirling,  articles  entitled  "Kant  Has  Not  Answered  Hume,"  published  in 
Mind,  Vols.  ix  and  x. 
t  Watson,  Kant  and  Bis  English  Critics,  chap.  vii. 


14 

apply  the  category.  "Watson  says  that  Stirling  has  not  understood 
Kant,  who  holds  that  no  experience  of  the  objective  sequence  of 
objects  or  events  can  be  had  at  all  without  the  aid  of  the  under- 
standing, and  that  so  far  from  trying  to  show  when  we  are  to  deter- 
mine sequences  as  objective,  Kant  is  really  asserting  that  we  can 
have  no  experience  of  objective  sequence  at  all  without  the  cate- 
gory. Prof.  Watson  seems  to  us  to  be  right  and  the  criticism  of 
Dr.  Stirling  wide  of  the  mark.  But  nevertheless  the  Kantian  proof 
is  open  to  criticism.  The  question  at  once  suggests  itself  as  to 
whether  this  invariable  sequence  is  causality.  While  it  is  invaria- 
ble sequence  in  one  sense,  it  is  not  the  invariable  sequence  of  caus- 
ality. To  illustrate  this,  take  an  example  of  subjective  sequence 
such  as  that  mentioned  by  Kant  with  reference  to  the  perception  of 
the  parts  of  a  house  where  the  sequence  is  arbitrary  in  order.  Now, 
in  comparison  with  this,  Kant's  sequence  is  truly  invariable;  for 
example,  in  one  single  instance  the  events  happen  in  a  certain  order 
which  is  invariable  in  that  one  case,  but  not  necessarily  so  when  the 
same  events  happen  again ;  so  that  they  are  invariable  only  in  a 
sense  very  different  from  that  in  which  a  true  causal  sequence  may 
be  said  to  be  invariable.  Either  Kant  must  mean  invariable 
sequence  in  one  instance  only  as  distinct  from  the  play  of  fancy,  and 
then  he  has  not  proved  causality;  or  if  he  has  proven  causality, 
then  he  has  done  away  with  the  possibility  of  the  experience  of 
non-causal  sequences  which  we  undoubtedly  have.  There  must  be, 
then,  some  mark  by  which  to  distinguish  the  causal  sequence  from 
the  invariable  sequence  of  Kant.  It  is  found  in  the  dynamic  notion 
of  efficiency  and  force.  The  omission  of  this  idea  is  the  fundamen- 
tal defect  in  the  Kantian  doctrine  on  this  subject.  He  holds,  in  the 
case  where  the  "  leaden  ball "  produces  a  hole  in  the  "  cushion," 
that  it  is  the  definite  order  in  time  which  brings  it  about  that  the 
hole  in  the  cushion  would  not  produce  the  leaden  ball,  thus  making 
a  very  minute  distinction  of  an  order  in  time  where  there  is  not 
necessarily  a  lapse  of  time.  But  these  two  things,  the  ball  and 
cushion  in  contact,  exist  absolutely  simultaneously.  Hence  it  is  not 
the  order,  but  the  want  of  energy  or  force  in  one  instance,  and 
the  presence  of  it  in  the  other,  which  makes  the  real  difference 
between  them.  This  shows  that  there  is  some  objectivity  in  causa- 
tion other  than  that  shown  by  Kant.  There  is  an  objective  effi- 
ciency in  one  thing  independently  of  the  finite  mind  which  is  not 
in  another.  The  dynamic  idea  is  all  important  for  science,  so  we 
see  that  Kant's  doctrine  of  causation  is  unsatisfactory  for  science. 
We  must  bear  this  in  mind  when  we  come  to  his  Theism,  for  if  a 
doctrine  of  causation  is  inadequate  for  science,  it  must  be  wrong 
a  fortiori  to  use  it  in  the  Metaphysical  sphere. 


15 

Taking  this,  then,  as  an  example  of  all  the  categories,  we  conclude, 
first,  that  there  is  a  unity  of  organic  experience,  and,  secondly,  an  ob- 
jectivity of  the  categories,  both  different  from  that  held  by  Kant. 
As  to  the  first  of  these  points,  Caird*  shows  that  the  unity  given  in 
Kant's  doctrine  of  the  understanding  is  not  a  necessary  but  only  an 
accidental  one.  If  the  consciousness  of  self  is  consciousness  of  syn- 
thesis, and  if  this  is  judgment,  then  the  Ego  and  its  categories  cannot 
be  separated ;  and  if  thought  itself  is  synthetic,  and  must  go  out  of 
itself,  then  the  understanding  cannot  be  separated  from  sense.  The 
unity  of  conscious  experience  is  not  the  mechanical  putting  together 
of  separate  parts,  but  the  differentiating  consciousness  of  that  which 
is  already  united  ;  the  recognition  of  the  distinctions  in  that  which 
is  a  unity  in  diversity.  And  secondly,  although  nature  depends  on 
Mind  and  is  the  revelation  of  an  idea,  yet  it  is  independent  of  the 
finite  mind.  The  cosmic  order  is  one  where  forces  are  playing 
independently  of  our  mind ;  forces  which  will  crush  us  if  we  come 
in  their  path.  The  reaction  from  the  eighteenth  century,  where 
this  view  was  so  exaggerated,  and  where  the  spontaneity  of  the 
individual  was  annihilated,  where  in  cognition  things  must  impress 
our  blank  minds,  and  where  in  morality  we  are  in  the  chains  of 
physical  necessity,  the  reaction  from  all  this  so  grandly  expressed 
by  Kant  is  carried  too  far.  There  is  a  necessity  in  the  categories 
which  bespeaks  an  origin  other  than  our  finite  rninds.  Nor  is  this 
a  return  to  the  old  position  that  things  exist  and  are  perceived  apart 
from  the  understanding  and  the  spontaneity  of  thought  which  then 
adds  on,  as  it  were,  necessity.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  the  assertion 
that  the  work  of  thought  cannot  be  separated  from  perception,  and 
also  that  the  Cosmos  is  not  a  dead  thing  as  in  the  philosophy  which 
Kant  was  criticising ;  it  is  the  assertion  of  its  intelligibility,  that  it 
is  built  on  the  framework  of  reason,  the  product  of  mind,  imma- 
nent with  rationality,  so  that  the  finite  mind  finds  its  forms  in  it, 
thus  reaching  truth  which  is  objective  and  at  the  same  time  making 
possible  "synthetic  judgments  a  priori"  To  say  that  the  Cosmos 
is  independent  of  our  finite  minds  is  not  to  say  that  it  is  independ- 
ent of  the  Universal  Mind.  The  alternative  is  before  us ;  we  must 
presuppose  that  reality  is  rational  or  we  must  go  back  to  Hume. 
Kant's  position  is  not  tenable.  His  objectivity  consists  in  being  a 
distinction  from  feeling  and  sensation,  it  cannot  logically  be  inde- 
pendent of  the  human  consciousness.  Dr.  Harris  f  has  given  forcible 
expression  to  the  train  of  thought  which  we  have  been  following. 
He  says :  "  It  is  only  because  the  constitution  of  the  universe  is 
accordant  with  these  principles  and  its  on-going  regulated  by  them, 

*  Caird,  The  Philosophy  of  Kant,  p.  381. 

t  Hams,  The  Philosophical  Basis  of  Theism,  p.  121. 


16 

that  the  universe  is  a  Cosmos  and  not  a  chaos.  They  are  the 
'flammantia  moenia  mundij  *  the  flaming  bulwarks  of  the  uni- 
verse, which  no  power,  not  even  'though  almighty,  can  break 
through  or  destroy,  and  within  which  the  Cosmos  lies  in  the  light 
of  rational  truth,  and  moves  in  the  harmony  and  order  of  rational 
law  to  the  realization  of  rational  ideals  and  ends.  Thus  the  princi- 
ples of  Eeason,  together  with  the  truths  inferred  from  them,  and  the 
ideals  and  ends  determined  by  them,  are  the  archetypes  of  Nature." 

In  view  of  all  the  preceding  we  are  forced  to  conclude  that  if 
Hume  is  to  be  answered  and  refuted,  it  is  not  by  one  of  the  two 
postulates  of  knowledge  laid  down,  but  by  both  together.  Thus 
the  Kantian  limit  of  knowledge  with  reference  to  noumena  in  the 
negative  sense,  that  is,  with  reference  to  the  mysterious  unknowable 
"things"  which  cause  in  some  way  our  sensations,  has  been 
removed,  and  it  has  been  removed  by  showing  that  on  Kant's  own 
principles  no  such  "  things ''  can  exist  and  that  the  world  of  our 
knowledge  is  the  real  world.  This  is  the  teaching  of  the  Neo- 
Kantians. 

But  there  next  arises  the  question  as  to  noumena  in  the  positive 
sense,  that  is,  as  to  objects  of  "  non-sensuous  intuition."  Kant  saw 
that  man  has  a  faculty  of  Reason  above  the  understanding,  the 
supreme  category  of  this  reason  being  unity.  Man  in  seeking  unity 
is  not  satisfied  with  the  system  of  nature  whose  unity  is  a  concate- 
nation of  law.  So  that  the  activity  of  mind  once  shown,  the  nat- 
ural course  of  mental  necessity  leads  us  to  demand  the  uncondi- 
tioned. Here  is  the  point  where  the  critic  of  Kant  who  is  familiar 
with  post-Kantian  Philosophy  must  praise  him  and  show  that, 
although  his  system  was  the  forerunner  of  British  Kantism,  such 
was  not  the  spirit  of  his  system.  Hamilton  f  praises  Kant  for  his 
Agnostic  position,  but  criticises  him  for  maintaining  that  the  idea 
of  the  unconditioned  is  natural  to  the  human  mind  and  something 
positive,  instead  of  showing  that  it  is  merely  a  negation  of  the  con- 
ditioned. Kant  is  greater  than  his  followers.  He  recognizes  the 
force  of  Reason,  and  seeks  to  leave  his  ideas  in  a  position  that  can 
be  vindicated  by  the  Practical  Reason.  But  the  grave  defects  in  his 
system  must  bear  their  fruit  here  also,  and  a  brief  survey  of  them 
will  prepare  the  way  for  a  consideration  of  his  discussion  on  Theism 
or  Rational  Theology.  Reason  demands  the  unconditioned  unity  in 
a  series  of  conditions,  Kant  tells  us.J  It  seeks  this  by  syllogisms 
which  proceed  through  prosyllogisms  to  the  unconditioned.  Thus 

*  Lucretius,  De  Rerum  Natura,  i,  73. 
f  Hamilton,  Essay  on  the  Unconditioned. 

JKant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  "Transcendental 
Dialectic,"  §3. 


17 
\ 

it  reaches  the  subject  which  can  never  be  predicate,  the  uncondi- 
tioned unity  of  all  phenomena,  and  unconditioned  unity  of  all 
things.  Thus  we  get  Eational  Psychology,  Eational  Cosmology, 
and  Kational  Theology.  But  reason  must  regard  these  as  merely 
empty  ideas  for  producing  a  higher  unity  than  that  of  the  under- 
standing. Keason  cannot  assert  the  reality  of  these  ideas,  because 
she  has  no  grounds  for  so  doing. 

Now,  in  the  first  place,  Kant  is  to  be  criticised  for  making  the 
ideas  of  Keason  mere  logical  universals,  thus  making  them  as  ab- 
stract instead  of  as  concrete  as  possible.  He  is  wrong  in  seeking 
them  through  syllogisms,  and  this  leads  him  into  his  difficulty. 
Cousin's  *  book  makes  this  the  main  point  of  the  whole  discus- 
sion. We  find  Kant  thus  separating  the  understanding  and  Reason, 
as  he  had  the  understanding  and  sense.  But  it  is  not  through  syl- 
logisms that  we  reach  these  ideas.  They  are  immanent,  involved 
in  the  scientific  cognition  of  the  understanding.  We  cannot  recog- 
nize the  categories  without  also  recognizing  the  spiritual  Ego 
whose  activity  they  are,  nor  without  recognizing  the  Cosmos  which 
they  constitute,  while  the  knowledge  of  all  this  as  relative  in- 
volves the  recognition  of  the  demand  of  Reason  for  Absolute 
and  Unitary  Being.  And  right  here  we  meet  another  confusion  of 
Kant's.  He  gets  the  idea  of  the  Cosmos  from  the  unity  of  phenom- 
ena, and  the  idea  of  God  from  the  unity  of  "  things  in  themselves." 
This  is  not  the  true  distinction.  The  way  which  seems  more  accu- 
rate is  to  recognize  the  function  of  Reason  in  the  sphere  of  the  Rela- 
tive, demanding  a  relative  noumenon  or  ground,  and  its  function  in 
the  Rational  stage  proper  demanding  the  Absolute  as  the  ground  of 
all  Relativity  both  in  its  phenomenal  and  noumenal  aspects. 

In  the  second  place  we  have  to  consider  Kant's  doctrine  of  the 
limit  of  knowledge  as  not  extending  to  these  ideas,  and  of  their 
purely  subjective  character.  One  source  of  this  doctrine  has  been 
removed  in  showing  their  concreteness  and  that  they  are  not  merely 
logical  universals.  But  Kant's  chief  reason  for  denying  knowledge 
of  these  is  the  same  which  has  held  him  back  from  the  full  truth  all 
along.  It  is  his  failure  to  recognize  that  reality  is  rational,  and  the 
false  presupposition  that  reality  is  given  by  sense.  Then  the  con- 
clusion is  inevitable  that  these  ideas  of  Reason  are  empty  because 
they  cannot  have  a  content  of  sense  intuitions.  But  if  we  recog- 
nize the  spiritual  nature  of  reality  this  presupposition  is  done  away 
with,  and  all  ground  for  denying  a  knowledge  of  rational  ideas  goes 
with  it.  Then  there  is  no  reason  for  saying  that  sensation  is  neces- 
sary for  all  knowledge  because  it  is  necessary  for  a  certain  kind, 
the  only  ground  for  such  a  statement  being  this  very  presupposi- 

*  Cousin,  The  Philosophy  of  Kant. 


• 

TTWTVTZ 


18 

tion.  If,  then,  we  deny  the  possibility  of  knowledge  in  the  sphere 
of  Keason  we  deny  that  the  real  is  rational,  and  if  we  deny  this  we 
can  have  no  knowledge  in  the  sphere  of  science,  so  that  we  must 
conclude  that  the  postulates  necessary  to  render  knowledge  possible 
in  scientific  cognition  make  it  possible  in  all  spheres.  Again  we 
must  say  either  Hume  or  a  knowledge  of  the  ideas  of  Keason, 
Kant's  half-way  position  is  untenable. 

We  leave  the  Kational  stage  within  the  sphere  of  the  Kelative 
which  demands  the  recognition  of  the  relative  noumena,  and  turn 
to  the  sphere  of  Eeason  proper  which  demands  the  Absolute  as  the 
ground  of  all  Eelativity.  Season's  category  unity  cannot  be  satis- 
fied with  two  relative  noumena,  and  moreover  the  consciousness  of 
ourselves  as  dependent  and  finite,  involves  the  knowledge  that  Abso- 
lute Being  must  exist.  This  is  the  first  great  truth  of  Philosophy, 
that  back  of  the  Eelative  exists  Absolute  Being.  But  immediately 
'questions  of  the  greatest  importance  press  upon  us.  What  is  the 
nature  of  Absolute  Being  ?  Can  it  be  known  ?  The  importance  of 
these  questions  cannot  well  be  exaggerated.  The  importance  of 
the  former  for  the  problem  of  knowledge,  which  we  have  been  con- 
sidering, is  fundamental.  The  complete  justification  of  the  assump- 
tion that  the  real  is  rational  will  depend  upon  the  determination  of 
the  Absolute  as  self-conscious,  personal  Spirit.  We  may  define  the 
Absolute  as  existing  out  of  all  relation  to  the  Eelative  and  as  includ- 
ing all  possible  modes  of  Being,  or  as  the  One  Substance,  or  Uncon- 
scious Idea,  the  result  of  which  will  be  to  give  the  Absolute  a  nature 
which  has  no  warrant  for  its  truth  in  experience,  a  nature  such 
that  all  knowledge  of  it  is  impossible  under  those  categories  in 
which  we  must  have  knowledge  of  it  if  we  can  know  it  at  all. 
The  conclusion  must  be  that  if  the  Absolute  is  out  of  all  relation  to 
us  we  can  never  attain  any  knowledge  of  it,  and  that  if  Being  is  iden- 
tical with  Non-being  or  Nothing,  the  whole  process  of  knowledge 
has  its  formal  basis  in  logic  taken  away,  and  the  Absolute  of  this 
Philosophy  becomes  the  Unknowable  of  the  Agnostics  who  have 
been  lead  to  their  position  from  the  Metaphysical  standpoint  by 
just  this  definition  of  the  Absolute  as  the  negation  of  all  that  we 
can  know.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  if  Absolute  Being  is  God,  a 
self-conscious  personal  Spirit,  then  the  postulates  of  knowledge  are 
fully  justified.  Knowledge  we  saw  was  impossible  on  the  supposi- 
tion that  there  was  any  reality  other  than  the  content  of  our  objec- 
tive ideas,  that  in  reality  is  that  which  is  the  direct  object  of  our 
consciousness  and  there  is  no  thing  in  itself  which  makes  this  un- 
real or  phenomenal.  But  in  order  that  we  may  show  that  this  is 
knowledge  in  the  true  sense,  we  must  show  that  the  world  is  the 
product  of  Intelligence ;  for  if  an  intelligent  idea  is  not  immanent 


19 

in  it,  it  cannot  be  in  direct  relation  to  consciousness  as  the  object  of 
its  knowledge,  and  our  knowledge  is  subjective  after  all.  Also  if 
the  Absolute  be  not  more  completely  determined  its  unknowability 
must  follow.  Eeligion  and  Morality  are  also  at  stake.  Everything 
depends  on  holding  right  ideas  as  to  the  relation  of  man,  the  world, 
and  God.  If  they  are  not  kept  distinct,  Keligion  and  Morality, 
which  have  to  do  with  the  relation  of  the  individual  to  God  and 
Duty,  suffer.  If  on  the  other  hand,  these  three  ideas  are  isolated 
and  out  of  mutual  relations  our  knowledge  of  all  that  is  unphe- 
nomenal  becomes  impossible.  Now  it  is  only  God  and  not  an 
abstraction  such  as  Absolute  Being  which  can  stand  in  proper  rela- 
tions to  man  and  the  world.  As  Coleridge,  the  poet-philosopher 
puts  it : 

"  'Tis  the  sublime  of  man, 

Our  noontide  majesty,  to  know  ourselves 

Parts  and  proportions  of  one  wondrous  whole  ! 

This  fraternizes  man,  this  constitutes 

Our  charities  and  bearings.     But  'tis  God 

Diffused  through  all,  that  doth  make  all  one  whole." 

The  Absolute  Being  must  be  of  such  a  nature  as  to  reveal  Him- 
self to  us  in  all  the  relations  involved  in  Knowledge,  Morality,  and 
Keligion.  "We  must  choose  between  the  doctrine  "  Omnis  determina- 
tio  est  negatio"  and  that  of  Leibnitz,  who  says  :*  "  The  perfections 
of  God  are  those  of  our  own  souls,  but  He  possesses  them  without 
bounds.  He  is  an  ocean  from  whom  we  have  received  but  a  few 
drops.  There  is  some  power,  some  knowledge,  some  goodness  in 
UP,  but  they  are  whole  and  entire  in  God.  Order,  proportions  and 
harmony  enchant  us;  painting  and  music  are  samples  of  them. 
God  is  all  order.  He  always  keeps  an  exquisite  justness  of  propor- 
tions. He  creates  the  universal  harmony.  All  beauty  is  an  expan- 
sion of  His  rays."  From  what  has  been  said  it  will  be  seen  that  it 
is  necessary  that  the  Absolute  be  Spirit.  But  this  notion  involves 
first  intelligence,  and  secondly  energizing  activity  in  accordance 
with  a  moral  nature.  Now  these  two  notions  involve  those  of  self- 
consciousness  and  personality,  and  thus  the  highest  metaphysic 
accords  with  experience  for,  while  we  know  unconscious  states  of 
self-conscious  spirit,  we  do  not  know  unconscious  spirit,  and  that 
which  we  do  know  by  direct  introspection  is  conscious  and  personal. 
Lotze  teaches  us  that  experience  justifies  the  position  we  have  stated. 
He  says,t  "  We  cannot,  however,  for  a  moment  admit  that  this  con- 
ception of  an  unconscious  Spirit  has  in  this  sense  any  real  meaning 
whatever.  We  cannot,  indeed,  deny  that  there  are  within  our  spir- 
itual life  unconscious  states  and  processes,  but  it  does  not  follow 

*  Leibnitz,  Essais  de  Theodicee,  quoted  by  Saisset,  Modern  Pantheism. 
f  Lotze,  Philosophy  of  Religion,  p.  55. 


20 

that  these,  as  unconscious,  and  as  at  the  same  time  states  of  a  Spirit, 
ever  occur  except  in  those  beings  which  are  by  nature  conscious 
spirits.  We  must  only  look  upon  them  as  cases  in  which  a  con- 
scious, spiritual  life  is  arrested  or  limited."  We  have  learned,  then, 
that  for  the  sake  of  the  gravest  interests  of  humanity,  the  Absolute 
must  be  recognized  as  a  self-conscious  and  personal  spirit,  and  from 
Lotze  we  have  learned  that  this  accords  with  experience.  More- 
over the  solution  of  all  subsequent  questions  of  Metaphysics  will 
have  a  character  determined  by  the  way  in  which  this  first  question 
is  settled.  It  is  not  enough  to  say  that  the  Ultimate  Eeality  is 
spirit.  The  whole  Hegelian  movement  was  anti-materialistic,  but 
because  it  failed  to  attribute  self- consciousness  and  personality  to 
Absolute  Being,  it  could  not  grasp  the  fact  of  Creation  in  any  other 
way  than  that  of  the  necessary  evolution  of  the  Absolute,  thus 
losing  all  the  Eeality  of  the  Eelative,  the  consequences  of  which  in 
the  sphere  of  Eeligion  and  Morality  being  too  obvious  to  require 
stating.  Thus  the  doctrine  of  creation  and  with  it  that  of  the  human 
psyche  and  the  Cosmos,  depend  on  the  question  at  issue.  Further- 
more Being  which  is  nothing,  is  an  abstraction  which  can  never 
become  clothed  upon  with  concreteness  unless  it  have  in  it  a 
necessary  principle  of  movement,  but  if  it  is  Non-being  or  Nothing 
how  can  we  say  that  there  is  a  living  dialectic  in  it,  and  why  is 
not  Agnosticism  a  more  logical  development  from  such  a  doctrine 
than  Hegelianism  ?  If  Metaphysic  is  to  be  at  all  possible  in  any  true 
sense,  we  must  have  God  as  the  starting  point  and  not  the  culmina- 
tion only.  Thus  the  question  to  be  discussed  and  in  which  we  are 
to  seek  the  cure  for  Agnosticism^  should  at  the  same  time  be  a  cor- 
rective for  the  Pantheism  of  Hegel.  That  Agnosticism  and  Pan- 
theism are  to  have  the  same  remedy  does  not  seem  strange  when 
we  reflect  that  it  was  the  defect  of  Kantism  which  led  on  to  Fichte, 
Schelling,  and  Hegel.  This  same  point  should  be  one  of  correction 
for  the  school  of  thinkers  who  think  that  the  problem  of  knowl- 
edge is  to  be  solved  by  breaking  away  from  the  individualistic  ten- 
dencies of  Kant,  but  who  are  not  careful  to  avoid  his  abstraction. 
It  is  not  by  avoiding  any  one  .cause  of  the  Kantian  limitations  that 
we  can  hope  to  find  a  satisfactory  solution  of  the  problem  of  knowl- 
edge. It  can  be  done  only  by  a  careful  consideration  of  the  merits 
and  failures  revealed  by  the  history  of  thought.  Kant  has  shown 
that  the  categories  and  synthetic  unity  of  apperception  are  neces- 
sary for  knowledge.  But  this  self-consciousness  was  human  and 
moreover  only  an  empty  notion.  Now,  says  the  school  in  question, 
the  rational  is  the  real,  so  for  the  individual  thought  without  a 
thinker  substitute  a  Universal  Idea  or  spiritual  principle  without 
transcendent  personality,  and  the  problem  is  solved.  But  when  we 


21 

have  a  principle  which  is  merely  the  unity  of  subject  and  object, 
and  when  we  have  substituted  the  universal  thought  for  the  indi- 
vidual we  are  no  farther  away  from  abstractions.  At  the  very  out- 
set we  said  that  for  Kant's  "  synthetic  unity  of  apperception"  was  to 
be  substituted  the  concrete,  individual,  self-conscious,  personal  u  I," 
so  now  it  is  this  "  I  "  which  should  be  raised  to  universality,  and  not 
the  abstraction  of  Kant.  The  problem  is  to  be  solved  in  such  a 
way  that  we  can  say  that  our  thoughts  are  the  correct  ideas  of 
reality,  and  not  by  the  identification  of  the  rational  and  the  real, 
for,  while  we  have  claimed  that  a  necessary  postulate  of  knowledge 
is  that  the  real  is  rational,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  the  rational 
is  the  real  in  the  sense  that  the  two  spheres  are  identical  and  coex- 
tensive, for  reality  as  spirit  is  far  wider  than  mere  thought.  More- 
over, when  we  have  said  that  Kant's  acknowledgment  of  the 
spiritual  activity  of  the  ego  leads  us  to  link  our  organic  experience 
or  knowledge  to  a  real  noumenal  subject  which  is  concrete,  instead 
of  to  the  acceptation  of  Kant's  own  doctrine  which  was  the  result 
of  presuppositions  contrary  to  the  spirit  of  his  system,  we  have,  I 
think,  shown  that  N"eo  Kantism,*  as  represented  by  such  men  as 
Cohen,  Lange,  and  Yaihinger,  is  not  a  true  development  of  the 
spirit  of  Kantism.  These  men  say,  and  rightly  too,  we  think,  that 
on  Kantian  principles  there  can  be  no  thing  in  itself  in  the  Kantian 
sense,  this  is  a  mere  category  to  complete  experience ;  but  then  they 
accept  Kant's  doctrine  of  the  merely  logical  and  subjective  char- 
acter of  the  ego,  and  so  hypostatize  experience,  resting  it  on  nothing. 
Here  is  abstraction  again.  If  the  spirit  of  Kant  has  taught  us  any- 
thing, it  has  taught  us  that  the  noumenal  reality  of  the  ego  is  neces- 
sary to  experience  so  that  we  have  an  anchorage  at  once  immanent 
and  transcendent.  But  now  having  done  away  with  the  abstract 
Kantian  thing  in  itself,  the  complete  justification  of  our  belief  that 
the  Cosmos  or  world  of  our  knowledge  is  the  real  world,  depends 
on  whether  or  not  the  Absolute  is  a  Personal  Spirit  who  can  be  at 
once  immanent  and  transcendent,  and  create  the  Cosmos  according 
to  principles  with  which  He  has  endowed  His  creatures.  Having 
a  belief  in  ourselves  and  God  we  have  no  difficulty  in  accepting  the 
fact  that  it  is  by  Keason  and  not  by  sense  that  we  get  the  reality  of 
the  Cosmos,  and  are  content  to  let  Psychologists  debate  as  long  as 
they  will. 

Furthermore  it  was  the  abstract  and  a  priori  definition  of  the 
Absolute  in  a  way  which  has  no  justification  in  experience  which 
led  Sir  William  Hamilton  and  Dean  Mansel  to  Agnosticism. 
Abstraction  is  the  bane  of  all  true  Philosophy.  We  have  just 

*See  Stahlin,  Kant,  Lotze  and  Ritschl;  also  Seth,  article  entitled  "The  Epis- 
temology  of  Neo  Kantism,"  Philosophical  Review  for  May,  1893. 


22 

mentioned  Agnosticism.  Its  cure  lies  just  at  this  point.  Kant's 
question  was  that  of  knowledge,  and  so  we  are  especially  con- 
cerned with  this  relation  of  Theism  to  Epistemology.  The  imme- 
diate cause  of  Agnosticism  is  Epistemological,  that  is  the  sub- 
jectivity of  the  human  Eeason,  but  the  cause  of  this  is  the  identi- 
fication of  the  Absolute  with  Non-being  or  pure  abstraction.  Are 
the  categories,  which  render  possible  synthetic  judgments  a  priori, 
those  of  God  who  created  the  Universe  rational  and  placed  in  our 
mind  the  frame  work  of  reality,  or  are  they  merely  individual 
forms,  and  we  thus  forever  shut  up  to  Kantism  ?  The  answer  to 
this  depends  on  our  determination  of  the  Absolute  as  a  self-con- 
scious and  personal  Spirit,  for  only  such  a  Being  can  be  self-reveal- 
ing, and,  as  has  been  said,  if  men  are  left  with  a  reason  which 
differs  essentially  from  reason  Universal,  to  grope  after  God,  they 
must  end  in  despair,  and  everywhere  will  be  found  altars  "  to  the 
unknown  God."  But  if  He  be  a  self-conscious,  personal  Spirit  then 
is  He  near  to  each  one  of  us  and  every  way  to  Him  is  one  which 
He  Himself  has  made  and  which  humanity  has  but  to  traverse. 
Eeason,  the  great  emotions  common  to  all  humanity,  Science, 
Morality  and  Religion,  every  road  will  lead  us  to  Him,  humanity 
will  be  filled  with  His  presence,  and  Philosophy's  main  problem 
will  be  solved. 

There  is  another  thought  which  will  help  us  in  examining 
Kant's  Theism,  and  which  is  suggested  by  the  two  movements 
resulting  from  his  system,  and  which  have  been  mentioned.  Both 
transcendental  Idealism  and  Agnosticism  stand  alike  open  to  criti- 
cism for  making  Being  Nothing,  but  there  is  another  point  of  view 
in  which  they  differ  totally,  and  from  which  a  lesson  of  vital 
importance  in  examining  Kant  will  be  gained.  The  difference 
between  the  two  systems  mentioned  may  be  expressed  by  the  word 
immanence.  The  Agnosticism  of  Spencer,  besides  coming  from  his 
abstract  definition  of  the  Absolute,  results  also  from  the  fact  that  he 
thinks  that  he  can  explain  the  world  by  matter  and  a  Relative 
Force,  so  that  the  Absolute  stands  apart  and  is  unknowable.  But 
in  Hegelianism  the  case  is  entirely  different.  The  Absolute  is 
everything  to  this  system.  Immanence  is  the  profound  truth  to  be 
learned  from  this  system,  and  which,  if  rightly  apprehended,  will  do 
away  with  Agnosticism.  Kant's  God  is  only  transcendent,  and  his 
doctrine  must  be  transcended  in  a  system  which  will  recognize  the 
truth  of  immanence,  and  the  great  question  now  is  how  can  we 
have  an  immanent  and  at  the  same  time  a  transcendent  God,  and  a 
world  and  creatures  distinct  from  Him  and  finite.  If  we  ascribe 
self- consciousness  and  personality  to  God,  and  realize  that  this 
involves  a  consciousness  of  self  as  distinct  from  both  nature  and 


other  personalities,  then  God  can  be  conceived  as  separate  from,  as 
well  as  revealed  in,  nature  and  the  human  psyche.  Transcendence 
is  not  to  be  lost  sight  of  in  emphasizing  immanence ;  we  must  have 
a  God  above  as  well  as  in  man  and  nature  or  we  must  give  up 
Ethics,  yes,  and  Christianity  too,  for  there  is  not  one  Bible  doctrine 
that  can  stand  if  only  immanence  be  true.  But  immanence  is  only 
half  the  truth.  There  is  no  opposition  between  immanence  and 
transcendence.  But  only  a  self-conscious  and  personal  God  can  be 
at  the  same  time  immanent  and  transcendent. 

Now  the  true  nature  of  Theism  which  holds  fast  both  immanence 
and  transcendence,  and  can  show  that  they  are  not  mutually  exclu- 
sive ideas  because  God  is  self-conscious  and  personal,  needs  empha- 
sis. No  less  a  thinker  than  Schopenhauer  has  not  grasped  it,  and 
he  speaks  of  the  far-away  Unknowable  of  Agnosticism  and  the 
mechanically  conceived  God  of  the  eighteenth-century  Deism  as 
though  they  were  the  God  of  Theism,  saying  that  before  Kant  there 
was  a  dilemma  between  Materialism  and  Theism,  but  that  Kant  has 
given  us  a  starting  point  for  a  third  alternative  which  will  free  us 
from  the  dilemma.  He  says  :*  "  Before  Kant  there  was  a  real 
dilemma  between  Materialism  and  Theism,  that  is,  between  the 
supposition  that  either  a  blind  fate,  or  an  Intelligence  directing 
things  from  the  outside  according  to  ends  and  concepts,  had 
brought  the  world  into  being,  nor  was  there  any  third  alternative. 
....  But  now  Kant,  by  his  profound  distinction  between  phe- 
nomenon and  the  thing  in  itself,  has  taken  the  foundation  from 
Theism,  and  has  opened  the  way  on  the  other  hand  to  an  entirely 
different  and  more  profound  interpretation  of  Being."  Here  we  see 
that  Schopenhauer  has  misunderstood  Theism.  It  is  true  that 
Kant  has  "  taken  away  the  foundation  "  from  the  theory  that  an 
Intelligence  directing  in  a  mechanical  way  from  without  is  at  the 
ground  of  things,  but  this  is  Deism  and  not  Theism.  Now  between 
Materialism  and  Theism  rightly  understood  as  including  both 
immanence  and  transcendence,  our  choice  has  still,  and  always  will 
have  to  be  made,  for,  as  Schopenhauer  says,  Kant  has  driven  us  from 
Deism,  and  we  cannot  accept  any  theory  which  recognizes  only 
immanence  because  personality  and  self-consciousness  are  ultimates. 
The  answer  of  Schopenhauer  to  the  great  question  is  no  better  than 
that  of  Hegel,  for  we  cannot  say  that  the  Ding  an  sick  is  blind  will 
striving  to  be,  because  will  separated  from  Intelligence  is  as  much 
of  an  abstraction  and  impossibility  as  Being  which  is  Nothing  and 
has  to  "  become  "  before  it  can  really  and  self-consciously  be.  If  it 
could  be  so,  despair  would  be  the  last  word  of  Philosophy.  Amid 
the  deep  sorrows  of  life  and  its  daily  cares  which  sometimes  seem 

*  Schopenhauer,  Die  Welt  als  Wille  und  Vorstellung,  p  608. 


24 

so  heavy,  instead  of  hope  to  sustain  men,  the  best  that  they  could  do 
would  be  to  cease  to  will  to  live.  Between  Theism,  then,  and  the 
"  blinder  Zufall "  our  choice  must  be  made.  Blind  chance  or  Intel- 
ligence, and  not  Intelligence  merely  but  personal  self-conscious 
Intelligence,  for  here  alone  immanence  and  transcendence  can  unite. 

It  is  clear,  then,  that  the  interests  nearest  the  heart  of  humanity 
depend  on  whether  or  not  the  Absolute  Being  is  God,  that  is  a  self- 
conscious  and  personal  Spirit. 

The  question,  then,  is  whether  the  Absolute  of  Philosophy  is 
God,  that  is,  a  self-conscious,  personal  Spirit. 

The  question  now  comes  up  as  to  whether  there  is  any  a  priori  rea- 
son for  believing  that  this  is  so.  Eeason  gives  an  affirmative 
answer.  Her  supreme  category  is  Unity.  A  complete  and  abso- 
lute Unity  must  be  attained.  Now  there  are  the  spheres  of  nature 
and  of  freedom.  But  nature  is  independent  of  our  finite  wills.  If 
therefore  all  we  can  say  is  that  Absolute  Being  exists,  the  dualism 
between  nature  and  freedom  cannot  be  done  away  with.  The  only 
possible  unity  is  one  where  the  ends  of  freedom  are  realized  in 
nature,  and  this  can  be  only  if  nature  is  controlled  by  a  Unitary 
Being  which  is  active  for  ends,  directing  nature  for  the  realization 
of  these  ends  of  freedom.  Mechanism  is  not  chance  but  law,  and 
the  idea  of  law  includes  in  it  that  of  an  end.  Thus  mechanism  leads 
by  necessity  to  Teleology,  and  the  only  unity  is  a  teleological  one 
where  self-conscious  intelligence  and  will  is  subjecting  Mechanism 
to  its  own  ends.  The  supreme  unity  is  found  when  Mechanism  and 
Teleology  harmonize  in  the  nature  of  a  Being  who  is  the  source  of 
both  moral  and  natural  law.  Keason  is  satisfied  only  where  the 
heart  is  satisfied,  in  the  belief  and  knowledge  that  above  all  is  one 
personal,  self-conscious  Spirit,  the  Absolute  God  who  has  predeter- 
mined all  things  for  the  realization  of  His  own  glory  and  the  well- 
being  of  humanity.  Kant  recognizes  this  a  priori  necessity.  He 
argues  *  that  the  Absolute  must  be  conceived  as  one  and  individual 
because  it  is  the  primal  source  of  all  things  ;  and  in  another  place,f 
he  tells  us  that  the  highest  unity  is  a  teleological  one  so  that  Intel- 
ligence must  be  predicated  of  the  Absolute.  In  fact  the  connecting 
link  of  Kant's  whole  system  is  Teleology.  He  sets  forth  Nature 
and  her  categories  in  the  Critique  of  Pure  Reason  ;  and  after  leaving 
noumena  beyond  the  reach  of  knowledge  so  that  we  cannot  even  say 
that  they  exist,  he  shows  us  that  they  exist  and  opens  up  the  world 
of  freedom  in  the  Critique  of  Practical  Reason  ;  but  he  connects  the 
two  spheres  in  his  Critique  of  Judgment  by  means  of  the  Teleologi- 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pare  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,   "Transcendental 
Dialectic,"  Bk.  ii,  chap,  iii,  §  2. 
t  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Appendix  to  the  "Transcendental  Dialectic." 


25 

cal  judgment  which  reflects  on  nature  as  though  she  were  subject  to 
a  Supreme  Intelligence  and  realizing  the  ends  of  freedom.  But 
with  Kant  an  a  priori  necessity  is  only  a  subjective  one.  To  say  that 
anything  is  a  priori  with  him  is  equivalent  to  saying  that  it  is  sub- 
jective only,  and  he  seeks  to  show  that  all  arguments  a  posteriori 
with  reference  to  this  question  are  fallacious.  He  grants  what  has 
been  given  a  priori,  but  only  as  a  subjective  necessity,  and  then 
shows  the  dialectical  procedure  of  Reason  in  the  Theistic  argument. 

But  it  is  clear  from  the  introductory  remarks  on  knowledge  that 
this  identification  of  a  prioriness  and  subjectivity  is  groundless.  The 
fact  that  a  truth  is  a  priori  necessary  by  no  means  proves  that 
it  has  no  objectivity,  nor  does  it  even  leave  us  powerless  to  claim 
for  it  objectivity.  The  fact  that  it  is  a  priori  is  strong  evidence  of 
its  objective  truth.  And  it  is  also  true,  as  has  been  shown,  that 
Kant's  separation  between  the  a  priori  and  the  a  posteriori  in 
knowledge  is  false.  They  are  two  aspects  of  truth  which  is  a  unity. 
Therefore  the  a  posteriori  must  not  conflict  with  the  a  priori,  and 
if  we  find  that  it  does  we  may  be  sure  that  one  or  the  other  is  not 
genuine.  If  it  be  true,  then,  that  a  priori  we  must  say  that  the  Ab- 
solute is  self-conscious  and  personal  Intelligence,  then  it  is  of  the 
very  greatest  importance  that  this  be  justified  a  posteriori,  that  is, 
in  experience ;  for  if  this  be  not  possible  we  may  well  question  our 
supposed  a  priori  necessity.  Now  the  a  posteriori  justification  of 
our  belief  in  the  existence  of  the  Absolute  and  of  our  determination 
of  it  as  personal  self-conscious  Intelligence,  is  the  Theistic  argument. 
The  arguments  of  which  this  is  composed  are  a  posteriori  with  the 
exception  of  one  aspect  of  the  Ontological  argument.  The  question 
before  us,  then,  is  as  to  whether  or  not  the  Kantian  criticism  has 
overthrown  the  historic  Theistic  arguments. 

There  is  one  point,  however,  which  should  be  carefully  noted  before 
estimating  the  weight  of  Kant's  criticism.  It  is  that  the  idea  of  God 
which  he  uses  as  the  object  of  these  arguments  is  very  different  from 
the  God  of  Theism  when  rightly  understood  ;  and  also  very  different 
from  the  God  which  we  might  infer  from  what  Kant  himself  has  ad- 
mitted as  an  a  priori  though  subjective  necessity.  The  God  of  The- 
ism is  a  self-conscious  and  personal  Spirit  and  this  realizes  both  the 
ideas  of  immanence  and  transcendence.  Now  as  we  are  seeking  the 
a  posteriori  justification  of  that  which  we  have  determined  a  priori,  of 
course  this  same  idea  of  God  which  has  been  reached  a  priori  should 
be  the  subject  of  the  Theistic  argument.  Moreover  since  Kant  has 
admitted  the  a  priori  necessity  of  determining  the  Absolute  as  intel- 
ligent and  personal,  such  a  God  could  be  immanent  as  well  as  trans- 
cendent, and  such  a  Being  should  have  been  made  the  subject  of  his 
criticism.  But  such  is  not  the  case.  The  God  which  is  the  subject  of 


26 

his  remarks  on  the  Theistic  arguments  is  the  God  of  eighteenth-cen- 
tury Deism,  and  of  course  they  avail  against  this.  His  theory  of  knowl- 
edge was  marred  by  its  mechanistic  character,  and  so  the  objects  of 
knowledge  come  to  have  a  mechanism  about  them  and  exist  apart 
from  consciousness.  God  stands  apart  and  in  a  purely  external  and 
mechanical  relation  to  the  world  and  man.  The  idea  of  God  which 
he  gives  *  has  three  elements.  First  the  sum  total  of  the  possi- 
bility of  all  experience.  Second  the  conception  of  an  ens  realissi- 
mum.  And  in  the  third  place  the  attributes  which  we  get  by  what 
he  calls  "  hypostatizing  "  the  idea ;  that  is,  he  argues  that  from  it  all 
things  derive  their  reality  and  so  it  is  regarded  as  primal.  A  primal 
Being  must  be  one  and  simple.  Then  we  regard  it  as  the  ground 
of  all  things,  and  cogitate  the  whole  sum  of  our  experience  as  an  in- 
dividual whole,  giving  the  idea  of  individuality,  and  so  reach  the 
idea  of  God.  Now  nothing  could  be  more  mechanical  than  this. 
God  is  not  the  sum  total  of  all  existence  regarded  as  a  whole  and 
individual.  He  is  not  a  sort  of  mine  or  fund  of  reality  from  which 
we  draw.  He  is  not  a  sum  total  of  all  reality  as  though  reality 
were,  as  a  house,  made  of  different  mechanically  constructed  parts. 
God  is  a  spirit  existing  in  spiritual  relations  to  His  finite  creatures. 
It  was  just  such  a  mechanical  and  pantheistic  definition  as  this 
which  lead  Sir  William  Hamilton  and  Dean  Mansel  into  so  many 
difficulties.  Dr.  Eunze  f  speaks  to  the  point  on  this  mechanical 
conception.  He  says  that  the  mechanical  conception  of  a  sum  total 
which  limits  God  to  a  mere  aggregate,  is  not  interchangeable  with 
the  idea  of  the  Highest  Being.  "  Much  rather,"  he  says,  "  does  the 
highest  reality  lie  at  the  foundation  of  the  possibility  of  all  things 
as  a  cause  and  not  as  a  sum  total." 

We  must  carefully  bear  in  mind  that  it  is  God,  a  living  Spirit 
who  exists  in  spiritual  relations  to  us,  whom  we  are  seeking ;  and 
not  a  God  who  is  afar  off,  and  in  merely  mechanical  relations  to  us, 
or  else  out  of  all  relation. 

The  Theistic  arguments,  Kant's  treatment  of  which  we  are  now 
to  examine,  are  four  in  number.  There  is  the  Ontological  argu- 
ment which  tells  us  a  priori  that  if  the  Absolute  or  Necessary  Being 
exist  we  must  predicate  infinity  of  all  its  attributes,  and  identify  it 
with  the  All  Perfect  Being ;  and  a  posteriori  this  argument  ex- 
presses the  truth  that  God  through  this  perfect  idea  has  spoken  in  and 
to  the  consciousness  of  humanity,  so  that  His  existence  maybe  inferred 
as  the  cause  of  this  idea.  Next  there  is  the  Cosmological  argument 
which  proceeds  from  the  contingent  to  the  necessary,  and  thus  from 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pare  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  "Transc.  Dialect," 
chap,  iii,  8  2. 
fRunze,  Der  Ontologische  Gottesbeiceis,  p.  81. 


27 

this  we  infer  the  existence  of  a  necessary  Being  which  the  Ontologi- 
cal  argument  on  its  a  priori  side  tells  us  is  the  Most  Perfect,  the  In- 
finite Being.  Then  there  is  the  Teleological  argument,  which 
argues  from  the  adaptations  of  means  to  ends  in  nature  to  design, 
and  thence  infers  that  Intelligence  is  to  be  predicated  of  the  Absolute. 
Lastly  we  have  the  Moral  argument,  which  from  our  moral  nature 
and  the  supreme  categories  of  Morality  infers  the  moral  nature  of 
the  Absolute. 

The  most  notable  and  important  fact  with  reference  to  these 
arguments  is  their  vital  connection  with,  and  mutual  assistance  of, 
each  other ;  while  at  the  same  time  each  preserves  its  own  identity 
in  the  performance  of  its  special  function.  They  are  parts  of  one 
whole,  which  cannot  stand  hostile  criticism  if  separately  required  to 
perform  the  whole  task.  Thus  the  Cosmological  argument  gives  us 
the  existence  of  the  Necessary  Being,  but  nothing  more.  The  Teleo- 
logical and  Moral  arguments  give  us  attributes  of  this  Being,  while 
we  leave  experience  and  say  a  priori  that  these  attributes  are  infinite 
and  so  identify  the  Absolute  with  God.  Therefore  these  arguments 
can  neither  be  separated  nor  identified.  They  have  been  most 
happily  likened  to  a  bundle  of  twigs,  which  when  bound  together 
the  strongest  arm  cannot  break,  but  when  separated  may  be  broken 
by  the  weakest.  They  are  the  a  posteriori  ground  of  that  firm  con- 
viction that  the  Absolute  of  Philosophy  is  the  God  of  the  Bible,  and 
together  with  the  a  priori  ground  of  this  same  belief  they  change  it 
into  a  reflective  knowledge  by  which  man's  reason  bids  his  heart 
take  courage  as  it  faces  the  assaults  of  skepticism. 

Kant  first  criticises  the  Ontological  argument.*  He  discusses  it 
in  its  a  priori  form.  Anselmf  is  the  author  of  this,  so  we  must 
look  to  him  for  a  statement  of  it.  He  gives  it  thus :  "  And  we 
believe  that  Thou  art  a  Being  than  whom  a  greater  cannot  be  con- 
ceived  And  certainly  that  than  which  a  greater  cannot  be 

conceived  cannot  be  in  the  intellect  alone.  For  if  it  be  in  the  mind 
only  there  can  be  thought  a  Being  existing  in  reality  also,  which  is 
greater.  If  therefore  that  than  which  a  greater  cannot  be  conceived 
is  in  the  mind  only,  it  follows  that  that,  than  which  a  greater  can- 
not be  conceived  is  that,  a  greater  than  which  can  be  conceived :  but 
certainly  this  cannot  be.  There  exists,  therefore,  beyond  a  doubt  a 
Being  than  whom  there  can  be  no  greater,  both  in  thought  and  in 
reality."  Anselm's  reasoning  is  simply  that  if  we  could  conceive 
the  non-existence  of  that  than  which  a  greater  cannot  be  conceived, 
then  a  greater  could  be  conceived,  which  is  a  contradiction.  But,  of 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  "Transcendental 
Dialectic, "chap,  iii,  §4. 
t  Anselm,  Proslogion,  Caput  ii. 


28 

course,  this  is  after  all  merely  a  necessity  of  conception  founded  on 
the  impossibility  of  conceiving  the  opposite.  It  asserts  a  contradic- 
tion in  the  removal  of  existence  as  a  predicate,  asserting  that  it  is 
contained  necessarily  in  the  concept.  Now  Kant's  first  criticism  is 
that  the  arguments  which  have  been  drawn  to  show  the  corre- 
spondence between  thought  and  things  have  been  taken  from  judg- 
ments, not  from  things.  This  criticism  attacks  the  argument  as 
though  Anselm's  position  were  that  what  exists  in  intellectu 
exists  also  in  re.  But  this  is  not  his  argument,  as  Dr.  Patton*  shows. 
His  argument  is,  as  has  been  stated,  that  existence  is  necessarily 
in  the  concept  of  the  Perfect  Being.  Kant  realized  this,  and  pro- 
ceeded to  criticise  the  argument  in  this  form  by  showing  the  differ- 
ence between  analytic  and  synthetic  judgments,  and  that  being  is  not  a 
real  predicate.  He  argues  as  follows :  If  there  is  a  contradiction 
involved  in  the  denial  of  this  predicate,  it  must  be  contained  in  the 
concept ;  and  must  therefore  be  a  merely  logical  predicate  and  so  say 
nothing  as  to  reality :  therefore  though  the  annihilation  of  this  predi- 
cate involves  a  contradiction,  both  subject  and  predicate  may  be 
together  suppressed  without  contradiction.  But  if  the  judgment  is 
to  express  existence,  that  is  if  being  is  a  real  predicate,  it  must  add 
something  to  the  concept  and  so  its  removal  will  not  involve  a  con- 
tradiction. Moreover  existence  is  not  a  real  predicate,  or  there 
never  could  be  a  correspondence  between  the  concept  and  object, 
the  object  always  being  greater. 

Now  in  order  to  estimate  the  force  of  this  we  will  state  three  posi- 
tions which  may  be  held  with  reference  to  the  Ontological  argument. 

1.  There  are  those  like  Anselm,  who  hold  that  it  is  an  a  priori 
demonstration  of  existence. 

2.  There  is  the  view  of  Leibnitz,  f  who  believes  that  Anselm's 
argument  needs  to  show  first  that  the  idea  of  a  Most  Perfect  Being 
is  possible,  that  then  the  conclusion  follows,  and  that  this  is  done 
when  it  is  shown  that  there  are  no  contradictions  involved  in  this 
Idea  conceived  as  existing. 

3.  There  is  the  position  which  we  have  indicated,  that  the  a 
priori  side  of  the  argument  is  not  designed  to  prove  existence,  but  to 
show  that  the  Necessary  Being  of  the  Cosmological  argument  is  the 
Infinite  and  Perfect  Being  of  our  idea.     And  a  posteriori  this  argu- 
ment is   to   express  God's  witness  to  humanity  of  His  existence, 
through  this  perfect  idea. 

Now  the  first  of  these  positions  Kant  has  successfully  overthrown. 
His  arguments  against  any  a  priori  demonstration  of  God's  existence 
merely  from  the  idea  are  unanswerable.  There  are  a  priori  rea- 

*  Patton,  Syllabus  of  Lectures  on  Theism. 

t  Leibnitz,  Thoughts  on  Knowledge,  Truth  and  Ideas. 


29 

sons,  but  from  the  mere  concept  a  demonstrative  proof  in  the  Ansel- 
mian  way  is  not  possible.  He  has  also  been  successful  against  the 
position  of  Leibnitz;  for  if  the  possibility  of  the  idea  is  to  be  shown 
by  the  mere  absence  of  all  contradiction,  Kant's  distinction  between 
analytic  and  synthetic  judgments  will  rise  against  us,  and  the 
Leibnitzian  view  will  not  differ  from  the  Anselmian.  But  against 
the  third  position  Kant's  arguments  can  have  no  force.  He  has 
made  two  errors  in  his  criticism.  He  has  taken  the  a  priori  Bide  of 
this  argument,  which  is  only  designed  to  identify  a  certain  idea  with 
the  Necessary  Being  of  the  Cosmological  argument,  and  has 
required  that  existence  be  shown  a  priori.  But  that  which  is  the 
far  greater  mistake  is  the  fact  that  he  has  neglected  the  a  posteriori 
side  of  the  argument  altogether.  DesCartes  is  the  author  of  this 
aspect  of  the  Ontological  argument.  He  gives  the  Anselmian 
proof,  but  also  argues  that  the  idea  of  God  is  Perfect  and  Infinite, 
and  that  therefore  God  must  be  its  cause.  He  says,*  "And,  in 
truth,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  God,  at  my  creation, 
implanted  this  idea  in  me,  that  it  might  serve,  as  it  were,  for  the 
mark  of  the  workman  impressed  on  his  work ;  and  it  is  not  also 
necessary  that  the  work  should  be  something  different  from  the 
work  itself;  but  considering  only  that  God  is  my  Creator,  it  is 
highly  probable  that  He  in  some  way  fashioned  me  after  His  own 
image  and  likeness,  and  that  I  perceive  this  likeness,  in  which  is 
contained  the  idea  of  God,  by  the  same  faculty  by  which  I  appre- 
hend myself;  in  other  words,  when  I  make  myself  the  object  of 
reflection,  I  not  only  find  that  I  am  an  incomplete,  imperfect  and 
dependent  being,  and  one  who  unceasingly  aspires  after  something 
better  and  greater  than  he  is;  but,  at  the  same  time,  I  am  assured 
likewise  that  He  upon  whom  I  am  dependent  possesses  in  Himself 
all  the  goods  after  which  I  aspire,  and  that  not  merely  indefinitely 
and  potentially,  but  infinitely  and  actually,  and  that  He  is  thus  God." 
Kant  has  done  away  with  an  a  priori  demonstration  of  the  far- 
away God  of  the  eighteenth-century  Deism.  But  he  has  left 
untouched  the  Ontological  argument  as  the  grand  expression  of  the 
truth  of  Mysticism,  the  truth  that  God  is  near,  and  that  the  conscious- 
ness of  humanity  is  a  God-breathed  consciousness  with  a  God-given 
idea.  Negatively,  He  speaks  to  our  spirits  in  the  feeling  of  weak- 
ness and  dependence  which  grows  into  the  reflective  knowledge  of 
our  finitude.  In  the  dissatisfaction  with  the  world  and  ourselves 
we  see  that  we  are  not  of  earthly  origin,  that  there  is  in  us  that 
which  comes  from  a  source  above  Nature,  and  that  we  can  have 
been  produced  by  no  natural  process.  And  all  this  would  not  be 

*  DesCartes,  Discourse  on  Method  and  the  Meditations,  Meditat.  3,  also  The 
Principles  of  Philosophy,  Part  i,  \  18. 


30 

possible  if  God  had  not  inspired  our  consciousness  with  the  positive 
idea  of  Himself  as  the  Father  of  our  spirits.  In  ourselves  we  feel 
His  presence,  and  then  know  it ;  in  the  world  we  see  an  Ideal  that  is 
not  of  the  world.  God  as  a  self-conscious  and  personal  Spirit  can 
be  thus  near  to  us.  The  strongest  and  most  spiritual  minds  in  all 
ages  have  felt  His  presence,  and  have  testified  to  the  truth  of  Mysti- 
cism. God  is  truly  present  to  the  consciousness  of  humanity  both 
in  its  idea  of  Him  and  in  its  aspirations  after  Him.  He  has  spoken 
to  men,  and  Eationalism  can  never  dissuade  them  from  belief  in 
this  truth. 

Kant  next  criticises  the  Cosmological  argument.  This  is  the 
argument  from  the  contingent  to  the  necessary.  Aristotle  is  its 
author.  He  argues*  for  the  existence  of  a  First  Mover,  thus 
regarding  the  world  under  the  category  of  motion,  as  contingent. 
Kant  gives  the  argument  so  as  to  inclu.de  the  finite  ego  under  the 
category  of  contingency.  He  gives  the  argument  as  follows  :f  "  If 
something  exists,  an  absolutely  necessary  being  must  likewise  exist. 
Now  I,  at  least,  exist.  Therefore  there  exists  an  absolutely  neces- 
sary being."  The  argument,  he  says,  proceeds  thus.  "  A  necessary 
being  can  be  determined  only  in  one  way,  that  is  by  only  one  of  all 
the  opposed  predicates ;  therefore,  it  is  completely  determined  by 
its  concept,  and  there  is  only  one  concept  which  can  completely 
determine  a  thing  a  priori,  that  is  the  concept  of  an  ens  realissimum  ; 
therefore,  as  this  is  the  only  concept  by  and  in  which  we  can  cogi- 
tate a  necessary  being,  therefore  a  supreme  being  necessarily 
exists." 

Now,  in  order  to  meet  the  Kantian  criticism  of  the  Cosmological 
argument,  we  must  have  a  clear  idea  of  its  function  and  relation  to 
the  Ontological  argument;  that  is,  to  the  a  priori  side  of  that 
argument,  which  it  is  to  be  remembered  Kant  always  means, 
and  which  for  convenience  we  will  refer  to  as  the  Ontological  argu- 
ment in  discussing  Kant's  criticism  of  the  Cosmological.  The  Cos- 
mological argument  gives  us  the  existence  of  a  necessary  Being,  but 
cannot  determine  the  nature  of  that  Being.  The  Ontological  argu- 
ment a  priori  shows  us  that  if  such  a  Being  exists  its  nature  must 
be  of  a  certain  character ;  but  it  cannot  give  a  priori  demonstration 
of  the  existence  of  this  Being.  Now  Kant  makes  an  error  similar 
to  that  which  he  made  in  criticising  the  Ontological  argument.  He 
criticised  that  argument  as  though  it  were  designed  to  demonstrate 
a  priori  the  existence  of  a  Being  corresponding  to  its  concept. 
Now  we  see  that  he  states  the  Cosmological  argument  as  though  it 

*  Aristotle,  Metaphysics,  Bk.  ii,  chap.  vii. 

fKant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  Meiklejohn's  translation,  "Transcendental 
Dialectic,"  chap,  iii,  $5,  sq. 


31 

were  meant  to  perform  not  only  its  own  work,  but  that  also  of  the 
Ontological  argument  in  the  determination  of  the  nature  of  the 
necessary  Being.  That  which  he  terms  the  first  part  of  the  argu- 
ment shows  that  an  absolutely  necessary  Being  exists.  Now,  instead 
of  seeing  that  this  is  all  that  is  required  of  this  argument,  he  pro- 
ceeds to  add  the  Ontological  argument  as  a  second  step  in  the  Cos- 
mological ;  and  then  states  as  his  first  point  of  criticism,  that  experi- 
ence, that  is  the  Cosmological  argument,  merely  aids  Reason  to 
make  the  first  step  to  the  existence  of  the  necessary  Being ;  and  that 
we  must  turn  away  from  experience  to  the  conception  of  an  ens 
realissimum  to  determine  the  properties  of  this  Being,  so  that  the 
Cosmological  argument  becomes  the  Ontological.  Now  it  is  per- 
fectly true  that  the  Cosmological  argument  is  insufficient  by  itself ; 
but  Kant  should  have  realized  that  the  inference  to  the  existence 
of  a  necessary  Being  is  all  that  this  argument  can  be  legitimately 
required  to  do.  Moreover,  when,  after  adding  the  Ontological  argu- 
ment in  its  a  priori  aspect  as  a  second  step  in  the  Cosmological,  ho 
says  that  reason  believes  that  we  may  infer  the  existence  of  a  nec- 
essary Being  from  the  concept  of  an  ens  realissimum,  he  seems  to 
have  forgotten  that  he  has  admitted  on  the  very  same  page  that 
"  experience  is  held  to  aid  reason  "  in  showing  the  existence  of  a 
necessary  Being,  and  that  he  himself  added  this  second  part  "  to 
determine  the  properties,"  and  not  to  demonstrate  the  existence  of 
this  Being.  We  see,  then,  that  Kant's  first  criticism  of  this  argu- 
ment consists  in  putting  the  Ontological  and  Cosmological  argu- 
ments together,  and  criticising  each  because  it  cannot  perform  sepa- 
rately their  joint  task.  He  tries  also  to  bring  out  this  same 
criticism  by  logic.  He  says  that  the  nervus  probandi  of  the  Cos- 
mological argument  is  the  proposition  that  every  absolutely  neces- 
sary being  is  an  ens  realissimum ;  and  if  this  be  true,  since  all  entia 
realissima  are  alike,  it  follows  that  this  proposition  may  be  con- 
verted simply,  and  we  have  the  proposition  that  every  ens  realissi- 
mum is  a  necessary  being ;  and  this  proposition  being  determined 
a  priori  by  concepts,  we  have  the  Ontological  argument.  In  short, 
he  says  that  in  the  identification  of  the  ens  realissimum  with  the 
necessary  Being,  we  assume  that  we  can  infer  the  latter  from  the 
former.  But  this  is  not  true.  It  is  difficult  to  see  why  the  Cosmo- 
logical  argument,  in  turning  to  the  Ontological  to  determine  the 
nature  of  the  Necessary  Being  as  Infinite  in  its  attributes,  after 
having  shown  its  existence,  must  proceed  on  the  assumption  that 
the  Ontological  argument  must  show  a  priori  the  fact  of  existence. 
Kant  also  makes  the  following  objections  to  the  Cosmological 
argument  :*  First,  that  the  transcendental  principle  of  causality  is 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Pure  Reason,  "Transcendental  Dialectic,"  chap,  iii,  §5, 
p.  374. 


32 

only  valid  in  the  sensuous  world,  because  the  purely  intelligible  or 
intellectual  conception  would  never  produce  a  synthetic,  that  is,  an 
objective  proposition.  The  answer  to  this  objection  is  the  rejec- 
tion of  his  doctrine  of  the  limit  of  knowledge.  Thought  is  syn- 
thetic of  itself,  and  it  is  not  the  object  of  sense  which  makes  it  so. 
And  it  is  obviously  false  reasoning  to  argue  that,  because  in  scien- 
tific cognition  the  content  of  the  category  is  given  in  the  sphere  of 
experience,  therefore,  this  is  the  only  kind  of  causality  admissible. 
Of  course,  if  we  define  causality  as  invariable  sequence,  and  then 
say  that  this  includes  all  causality,  we  rule  out  the  Cosmological 
argument  by  definition.  But  his  doctrine  of  causality  as  merely 
invariable  sequence  is  inadequate  for  science ;  how  much  more  so, 
then,  must  it  be  for  metaphysics,  and  how  unfair  its  application  in 
this  sphere.  "We  cannot  use  a  purely  mechanical  and  physical 
category  when  we  have  reached  the  sphere  of  spirit.  The  contin- 
gent involves  the  necessary,  but  a  caused  cause  is  still  contingent. 
Our  idea  of  causation  is  not  fully  satisfied  with  a  cause  that  is  itself 
caused,  as  is  the  case  with  every  cause  in  the  relative  sphere ;  and 
the  mind  must  find  its  type  of  causation  in  the  causality  of  will  de- 
termined by  motive  and  character,  but  free  from  physical  necessity. 
If  this  be  not  admitted,  the  alternative  is  physical  necessity,  and 
this  leads  to,  or  rather  involves,  materialism.  The  categories  of 
science  may  be  used  with  no  materialistic  implications  at  all ;  they 
have  their  legitimate  sphere.  It  is  only  when  the  metaphysician 
tries  to  use  them  that  materialism  ensues.  Thus  Mr.  Spencer,  in 
trying  to  explain  the  universe  by  relative  and  material  forces,  ex' 
hypothesi  shuts  himself  off  from  any  valid  inference  to  the  Absolute 
and  his  postulate  of  the  Unknowable  has  nothing  on  which  to  rest. 
If  it  is  manifested  in  the  material  and  relative  force  which  explains 
the  universe,  the  implication  is  materialistic  as  to  the  nature  of 
ultimate  reality ;  or  if  this  Unknowable  is  entirely  apart  from  the 
relative  force  which  explains  things,  then  why  postulate  it  ?  This 
is  merely  to  show  the  danger  of  making  physical  categories  do 
metaphysical  work.  However,  in  making  the  inference  of  the 
Cosmological  argument,  we  go  beyond  the  sphere  of  natural  causa- 
tion in  the  very  idea  of  the  argument,  which  expresses  the  necessity 
of  the  existence  of  Absolute  Being. 

Kant's  last  objection  to  this  argument  is  that  the  impossibility 
of  an  infinite  series  of  causes  is  assumed,  and  that  this  is  a  prin- 
ciple which  cannot  be  justified.  This  is  simply  a  statement,  in  a 
slightly  different  form,  of  the  principle  of  which  we  have  just 
been  speaking,  or,  more  accurately,  may  be  inferred  from  this 
principle, — that  everything  contingent  must  have  a  cause.  The 
highest  category  of  causation  is  not  satisfied  with  anything  but 


33 

a  non-contingent  and  uncaused  cause.  The  stage  of  scientific  cog- 
nition is  not  denied  when  we  assert  this;  but  that  which  we 
recognize  as  real  in  one  stage  of  reflection,  is  seen  at  a  later  stage 
to  be  not  the  ultimate  reality ;  and  while  we  admit  the  reality  of 
the  one,  we  may  reflect  upon  it  as  only  a  partial  view  of  reality 
and  go  on  to  higher  categories.  If,  then,  we  are  to  admit  the 
validity  of  our  highest  spiritual  categories, — and  we  must  if  any 
knowledge  at  all  is  to  be  possible, — we  must  admit  that  an  infinite 
series  is  impossible.  Kant  goes  on  in  this  same  chapter  to  explain 
the  dialectical  illusion  substantially  as  follows.  On  the  supposition 
that  something  exists  we  cannot  avoid  the  inference  that  something 
necessary  exists.  But  let  us  form  any  conception  whatever  of  a 
thing,  nothing  prevents  me  from  cogitating  its  non-existence.  We 
may  thus  be  obliged  to  admit  that  all  existing  things  have  a  neces- 
sary basis,  while  at  the  same  time  we  cannot  cogitate  any  individual 
thing  as  absolutely  necessary  ;  and  the  conclusion  is  that  neither 
necessity  nor  contingency  are  properties  of  things,  but  merely  sub- 
jective principles.  In  other  words,  we  may  be  obliged  to  admit 
that  all  existing  things  have  a  necessary  basis,  and  yet  because  we 
cannot  find  this  among  any  of  these  contingent  things,  we  conclude 
that  these  principles  are  only  subjective,  or  else  we  break  down  in 
contradiction.  Obviously,  the  conclusion  does  not  follow.  If  we 
try  to  find  the  Absolute  as  one  of  the  series  of  contingent  things, 
we  find  that  we  can  cogitate  none  of  these  as  necessary.  But  it  is 
just  for  these  very  contingent  things  that  we  are  seeking  a  basis 
that  shall  not  be  one  of  them.  If  we  try  to  cogitate  the  Absolute 
Spirit  after  the  analogy  of  the  world-series  we  can  reach  no  result ; 
but  when  it  is  shown  that  it  is  a  false  supposition  that  all  objectiv- 
ity for  knowledge  is  given  by  sense,  then  we  need  not  conclude  that 
principles  which  transcend  the  sensuous  sphere  are  merely  subjec- 
tive. We  are  groping  for  Being  where  everything  is  Becoming; 
and  trying  to  find  a  changeless  resting  place  where  decay  is  a  prin- 
ciple as  well  as  beginning  to  be.  If  we  search  in  the  right  place, 
we  shall  find  that  Absolute  Being  is  not  far  from  every  one  of  us. 
Only  we  should  be  careful  to  let  the  brightest,  truest  light  within 
us,  show  us  where  to  look. 

The  Teleological  argument  next  meets  the  Kantian  criticism.  This 
argument,  which  Kant  calls  the  Physico-Teleological,  from  the  adap- 
tations which  are  observable  in  Nature  infers  design,  and  thence  at- 
tributes Intelligence  to  the  Absolute  Being.  This  argument  Kant 
says  deserves  to  be  mentioned  with  respect.  He  says,*  "  The  world 
around  us  opens  before  our  view  so  magnificent  a  spectacle  of 
order,  variety,  beauty,  and  conformity  to  ends,  that  whether  we 

*  Kant,  Critique  of  Pare  Reason,  "Transcendental  Dialectic,"  chap,  iii,  §  6. 


34 

pursue  our  observations  with  the  infinity  of  space  in  one  direction, 
or  into  its  illimitable  divisions  in  the  other,  whether  we  regard  the 
world  in  its  greatest  or  its  least  manifestations,  even  after  we  have 
attained  to  the  highest  summit  of  knowledge  which  our  weak  minds 
can  reach,  we  find  that  language,  in  the  presence  of  wonders  so  in- 
conceivable, has  lost  its  force,  and  number  its  power  to  reckon,  nay, 
even  thought  fails  to  conceive  adequately,  and  our  conception  of 
the  whole  dissolves  into  an  astonishment  without  the  power  of  ex- 
pression, all  the  more  eloquent  that  it  is  dumb."  Kant's  criticisms 
of  the  Teleological  argument  in  the  Critique  of  Pure  Reason  are 
two  in  number,  and  arise,  as  before,  from  the  fact  that  he  requires 
this  argument  to  do  the  work  of  three.  He  says,  in  the  chapter 
from  which  we  have  just  quoted,  "We  cannot  approve  of  the 
claims  which  this  argument  advances  to  a  demonstrative  certainty 
and  to  a  reception  on  its  own  merits,  apart  from  favor  or  support 
from  other  arguments."  Now  we  do  not  make  this  claim  for  it.  We 
neither  claim  for  it "  demonstrative  certainty,"  nor  that  it  can  be  con- 
sidered apart  from  other  arguments.  Let  us  see  exactly  what  can  be 
expected  from  it  in  its  organic  connection  with  the  other  argu- 
ments. 

The  Cosmological  argument  shows  us  that  a  Necessary  Being  must 
exist,  and  now  by  the  Teleological  argument  we  infer  that  it  must  be 
possessed  of  Intelligence  wonderfully  great,  which  the  Ontological 
argument  on  its  a  priori  side  shows  to  be  infinite.  The  Teleological 
argument,  then,  is  to  show  that  the  cause  of  the  world  is  an  Intelli- 
gent Cause,  and  this  is  all  that  can  be  legitimately  required  of  it. 
In  order  to  indicate  how  it  does  this  we  cannot  do  better  than  quote 
from  this  same  chapter  of  the  Critique  of  Pv*e  Reason :  "  The 
chief  momenta  in  the  physico-teleological  argument  are  as  follows : 
First,  we  observe  in  the  world  manifest  signs  of  an  arrangement  full 
of  purpose,  executed  with  great  wisdom,  and  existing  in  a  whole 
of  a  content  indescribably  various,  and  of  an  extent  without  limits. 
Second,  this  arrangement  of  means  and  ends  is  entirely  foreign  to 
the  things  existing  in  the  world,  it  belongs  to  them  merely  as  a  con- 
tingent attribute  ;  in  other  words,  the  nature  of  different  things  could 
not  of  itself,  whatever  means  were  employed,  harmoniously  tend 
towards  certain  purposes,  were  they  not  chosen  and  directed  for  those 
purposes  by  a  rational  and  disposing  principle  in  accordance  with 
certain  fundamental  ideas.  Third,  there  exists,  therefore,  a  sublime 
and  wise  cause,  or  several,  which  is  not  merely  a  blind,  all-power- 
ful nature,  producing  the  beings  and  events  which  fill  the  world  in 
unconscious  fecundity,  but  a  free  and  intelligent  cause  of  the  world. 
Fourth,  the  unity  of  this  cause  may  be  inferred  from  the  unity  of 
a  reciprocal  relation  existing  between  the  parts  of  the  world,  as 


35 

portions  of  an  artistic  edifice,  an  inference  which  all  our  observation 
favors,  and  all  principles  of  analogy  support." 

In  this  chapter  of  the  Critique  of  Pure  Reason  Kant  makes  two 
criticisms  of  this  argument.  The  first  he  expresses  thus — "  Accord- 
ing to  the  physicoteleological  argument  the  connection  and  har- 
mony existing  in  the  world  evidence  the  contingency  of  the  form 
merely,  but  not  of  the  matter,  that  is,  of  the  substance  of  the  world. 
....  This  proof  can  at  the  most  therefore  demonstrate  the  exist- 
ence of  an  architect  of  the  world  whose  efforts  are  limited  by  the  capa- 
bilities of  the  material  with  which  he  works,  but  not  of  a  creator  of 
the  world,  to  whom  all  things  are  subject."  Now  in  the  first  place  this 
objection  involves  the  asking  too  much  of  this  argument :  all  that  is 
sought  from  this  argument  is  to  show  that  the  Absolute  Being,  of 
whose  existence  as  the  cause  of  all  relativity  we  are  assured  on  other 
grounds,  is  possessed  of  intelligence.  This  would  be  a  sufficient 
answer  to  Kant's  criticism,  but  we  may  go  even  farther.  Dr.  Flint* 
says  that  this  objection  can  be  urged,  only  if  order  were  not  of  the 
very  essence  of  matter  itself,  and  not  merely  something  superim- 
posed in  the  arrangement  of  it.  "  Science,"  he  says,  u  shows  that 
the  order  in  the  heavens  and  in  the  most  complicated  organisms  is 
not  more  wonderful  than  the  order  in  the  ultimate  atoms  them- 
selves. The  balance  of  evidence  is  that  order  penetrates  as  deep  as 
matter  itself." 

Kant's  second  criticism  is  that  from  the  order  in  the  world  we 
can  infer  only  a  cause  proportionate  thereto.  "We  can  conclude  there- 
fore from  this  argument,  only  that  the  Intelligence  and  Power  of  the 
world-cause  is  very  great ;  but  not  that  the  Intelligence  is  infinite 
and  the  Power  absolute ;  and  they  must  be  so  determined,  as  such 
a  predicate  as  "  very  great "  gives  no  determinate  conception  of 
this  Being,  nor  does  it  inform  us  what  it  may  be.  Empirical  con- 
siderations failing  to  give  this  determination  to  the  concept,  we  ac- 
complish this  by  falling  back  upon  the  Cosmological  argument, 
which  is  the  Ontological  in  disguise.  "After  elevating  our- 
selves to  admiration"  of  the  power  and  wisdom  of  the  world's 
author,  and  finding  that  we  can  advance  no  farther  by  this  method, 
we  proceed  to  infer  the  contingency  of  the  world  from  the  order  in 
it,  and  then  argue  from  its  contingency  to  the  existence  of  a 
Necessary  Being,  and  thence  to  the  concept  of  the  ens  realissimum. 
This  objection  obviously  arises  from  the  demand  that  the  Teleolog- 
ical  shall  alone  do  the  work  of  all  three  arguments,  and  it  only 
gives  an  illustration  of  their  unity  and  organic  connection.  When 
Intelligence  has  been  predicated  of  the  Absolute,  this  argument  has 
performed  its  function.  "When  once  this  is  done  all  materialistic 

*  Flint,  Theism,  Lect.  vi. 


36 

explanations  of  ultimate  reality  become  impossible,  and  we  are  then 
obliged  a  priori  to  say  that  this  Intelligence  is  infinite.  Thus  it 
refers  directly  to  the  a  priori  argument  and  not  indirectly  through  the 
Cosmological  as  Kant  says.  It  does  not,  then,  depend  on  this  argu- 
ment, much  less  is  it  identical  with  it.  It  needs  only  the  Ontolog- 
ical  argument  on  its  a  priori  side  for  its  completion,  while  the  Cos- 
mological argument  needs  both  the  other  two. 

Kant's  criticism,  then,  amounts  to  showing  the  connection  of  these 
arguments,  since  his  objections  may  be  all  classed  under  two  heads : 
First,  those  criticisms  which  do  not  rest  on  the  separation  of  the 
arguments,  but  which  we  have  seen  only  to  avail  against  the  mechani- 
cally conceived  God  of  Deism,  but  not  against  a  God  who  is  a  Spirit 
at  once  immanent  and  transcendent;  and  secondly,  those  criticisms 
which  rest  on  the  separation  of  the  arguments,  and  the  requirement 
of  one  to  do  the  work  of  all ;  and  these  we  have  shown  to  be  unfair. 
We  may  learn  from  this  that  every  road,  whether  a  priori  or  a  pos- 
teriori, will  lead  us  to  some  aspect  of  Absolute  Being.  In  God  are 
all  things,  and  every  line  of  reasoning  must  culminate  in  Him  ;  while 
no  one  way  can  lead  us  to  the  whole  truth,  which  is  so  vast  that  the 
human  mind  can  never  hope  to  comprehend  it.  The  inspired 
writer  was  only  expressing  the  sense  in  which  we  must  all  be  Agnos- 
tics, when  he  said  :  "  Canst  thou  by  searching  find  out  God  ?"  And 
yet  it  is  because  "  He  is  not  far  from  every  one  of  us  "  that  we  ap- 
prehend Him  in  everything. 

We  have  yet,  however,  to  consider  Kant's  most  subtle  criticism  of 
the  Teleological  argument.  This  is  given  in  the  Critique  of  Judgment 
where  it  is  discussed  much  more  elaborately  than  in  the  Critique  of 
Pure  Reason.  This  criticism  is  that  finality  is  merely  a  subjective 
principle  of  reflective  judgment. 

In  order  to  make  clear  his  somewhat  confused  discussion  it  will 
be  necessary  to  state  a  little  more  precisely  the  steps  in  the  Teleo- 
logical argument.  Lotze*  has  hit  the  nerve  of  the  design  argument, 
though  his  criticism  of  it  does  not  seem  just.  He  says  that  the  argu- 
ment is  involved  in  a  piece  of  circular  reasoning,  because  it  rests  on 
the  assertion  of  the  improbability  of  certain  results  happening  if 
they  were  not  designed  ;  but  that  this  improbability  holds  only  if 
we  presuppose  design,  for  then  things  which  resulted  without  being 
designed  would  seem  exceptions  to  the  general  rule ;  but  if  we  do  not 
presuppose  design,  then  all  this  improbability  vanishes ;  for  the  argu- 
ment, says  Lotze,  rests  on  the  belief  that  "  what  is  without  purpose, 
perverse  and  irrational,  has  a  better  title  itself  to  existence,  or  is 
more  likely,  as  such,  to  be  real,  than  what  is  not  so."  This  is  not 
true.  The  design  argument  makes  no  presuppositions  as  to  what 

*  Lotze,  Philosophy  of  Religion,  chap,  i,  §§  10,  11. 


87 

is  or  is  not  likely  to  exist  in  such  and  such  a  case ;  nor  does  it  pre- 
suppose design ;  but  without  any  preconceived  ideas  at  all,  upon  ob- 
servation of  the  wonderful  adaptations  in  nature,  it  argues  that  it  is 
highly  improbable  that  this  could  have  happened  if  it  had  not  been 
designed.  Of  course  this  is  not  demonstration,  and  it  is  open  to 
critics  to  deny  this  improbability  on  which  the  argument  rests ; 
though  we  do  not  believe  that  they  can  show  adequate  grounds  for 
this  denial.  However  the  nerve  of  the  argument  is  this  improba- 
bility just  mentioned ;  and  the  argument  is  primarily,  as  has  been 
remarked,  "to  design"  and  not  "from  it." 

Three  distinct  steps  may  be  traced  in  the  argument.  First,  ob- 
servation shows  order,  harmony,  adaptation,  and  law  in  Nature. 
This  rests  on  observation,  and  is  not  denied  by  those  who  will  not 
admit  finality.  But,  in  the  second  place,  is  this  order  and  adaptation 
finality  ?  Are  there  ends  in  Nature?  Can  this  order  be  explained 
by  mechanical  causes  alone  ?  The  order  and  system  is  too  vast  and 
complex  to  have  been  produced  by  chance,  but  will  not  mechanical 
law  and  efficient  causation  explain  it?  Now  we  see  phenomena 
where  the  results  seem  to  have  required  such  an  extraordinary  and 
complex  combination  of  circumstances  and  mechanical  causes,  and 
where  there  is  such  an  agreement  of  the  present  with  the  future,  as 
Janet  *  puts  it,  that  we  are  compelled  to  believe  that  this  wonderful 
combination  could  not  have  been  brought  about  if  the  idea  of  the 
end  did  not  exist  in  the  cause  and  determine  the  means.  Now  we 
have  a  direct  knowledge  only  of  the  nature  of  our  own  acts,  but 
here  we  find  a  direction  of  means  to  ends.  But  the  actions  of  other 
men  resemble  our  own  in  every  particular,  and  it  seems  as  if  they 
were  directed  to  ends.  Then  the  acts  of  animals  while  differing 
from  those  of  men  in  that  we  do  not  ascribe  any  intentionality  to 
them,  which  is  not  the  question  here  as  should  be  carefully  noted, 
yet  resemble  them  in  being  apparently  directed  to  ends.  Next,  the 
relation  between  organ  and  function,  organism  and  environment,  is 
a  witness  of  adaptation.  In  view  of  all  this  we  conclude  that 
finality  is  a  law  of  nature.  But,  in  the  third  place,  does  finality  in- 
volve intentionality  '/  Can  we  infer  intentional  finality  and  hence  a 
conscious  and  intelligent  cause  of  it  ?  Here  we  argue  that  inten- 
tional finality  is  the  only  rational  view.  For  since  it  is  nature 
which  forces  us  to  admit  finality,  it  cannot  be  merely  subjective. 
We  have  left,  then,  as  a  cause  of  finality,  either  Nature  itself  or  con- 
scious Intelligence.  We  know  by  our  own  consciousness  that  intel- 
ligence is  a  sufficient  cause  for  it,  and  we  know  that  it  is  charac- 
teristic of  our  intelligence  to  act  for  ends ;  but  of  unconscious  finality 
we  know  nothing ;  so  we  conclude  that  it  is  more  logical  to  infer 

*  Janet,  Final  Causes,  Bk.  i,  chap.  i. 


38 

conscious  Intelligence  than  that  of  which  we  know  nothing,  not 
even  its  possibility.  Either  the  First  Cause  is  absolutely  unknow- 
able or  else  this  much  anthropomorphism  is  necessary.  It  is  the 
fact  that  we  are  created  in  God's  image  that  enables  us  to  know  Him. 
So  that  anthropomorphism  is  the  assertion  that  His  nature  is  in  us 
to  an  imperfect  degree,  and  not  an  imputation  of  our  nature  to  Him  ; 
and  it  is  difficult  to  see  why  Zoomorphism  should  be  preferred  to 
this.  We  are  now  concerned,  however,  not  with  the  Philosophy  of 
the  Unconscious,  but  with  Kant's  doctrine  of  subjective  finality ;  but 
because  of  the  difficult  nature  of  his  discussion  of  this,  we  have  out- 
lined these  steps  in  the  argument  in  order  that  we  may  use  them  as 
guides  in  our  examination  of  the  Kantian  doctrine,  to  which  we  now 
proceed. 

As  to  the  first  step  in  the  argument,  the  order  and  adaptation 
observable  in  nature.  This  he  recognizes  and  presupposes  in  the 
Critique  of  Judgment,  directing  his  whole  discussion  to  the  last  two 
steps  as  stated.  He  asks  whether  this  adaptation  is  "  purposive," 
and  whether  we  can  infer  an  Intelligent  Cause  of  the  world.  But 
he  mingles  these  two  points  in  the  discussion,  sometimes  considering 
both  at  once  and  sometimes  going  from  one  to  the  other,  so  that  we 
will  endeavor,  for  the  sake  of  clearness,  to  separate  these  points,  and 
to  present  a  brief  statement  of  his  views  on  each  of  these  points,  as 
given  by  him  in  the  Critique  of  Judgment. 

But  before  examining  his  theory  of  finality,  we  must  see  what 
the  assumption  of  order  and  harmony  involves.  Dr.  Flint  *  takes 
the  position  that  it  is  merely  a  kind  of  finality ;  but  Janet  f  and 
Diman  £  make  order  the  basis  of  a  separate  argument  for  intelli- 
gence, so  that  even  though  we  cannot  infer  finality  from  order,  we  may 
use  the  latter  in  our  Theistic  argument.  Kant  takes  this  order  for 
granted,  and  then  says  that  mechanical  causes  explain  it,  except  in 
some  cases  where  mechanism  breaks  down  and  where  we  must  con- 
ceive an  Intelligent  Cause.  Janet  has  made  this  mistake  also,  and 
Dr.  Patton  §  has  criticised  him  for  it.  The  relation  of  intelligent 
causation  to  mechanism  is  not  that  the  former  comes  in  when  the 
latter  breaks  down.  There  is  a  deeper  relation  than  this.  We  ask, 
even  where  things  are  explained  by  mechanical  causes,  what  is  the 
cause  of  these  causes  ?  The  Cosmos  is  a  vast  system  of  mathemat- 
ical relations  and  dynamic  sequences  apart  from  any  question  of 
finality.  Wow  we  cannot  propose  mechanical  law  as  the  explana- 
tion, because  it  is  precisely  this  law  which  we  are  seeking  to  account 
for,  so  that  this  would  be  begging  the  question.  Law  itself  is  the  thing 

*  Flint,  Theism,  Lect.  ii.  f  Janet,  Final  Causes,  Bk.  i,  chap.  v. 

%  Diman,  The  Theistic  Argument,  chap.  iv. 
§  Patton,  Syllabus  of  Lectures  on  Theism. 


39 

to  be  explained,  and  our  alternatives  are  chance  and  intelligence,  so 
tliat  if  we  abandon  the  former  we  are  driven  to  the  latter.  There 
is  no  other  alternative,  since  we  have  seen  it  to  be  a  petitio  principii 
to  hypostatize  law,  making  a  metaphysical  entity  out  of  it  for  its 
own  explanation.  And  no  more  can  we  hypostatize  chance.  So  that 
it  seems  that  intelligence  is  the  only  possible  conclusion.  The 
world,  considered  as  a  Cosmos,  is  nearly  as  wonderful  as  when  con- 
sidered under  the  category  of  finality.  It  seems,  then,  that  Kant's 
admission  of  the  reign  of  law  makes  the  concession  which  the 
Theist  wishes,  even  though  finality  could  not  be  proved.  The 
argument  from  finality,  however,  is  a  still  stronger  evidence  of  in- 
telligent causation,  so  that  it  is  of  the  greatest  importance  to  the 
Theist  in  giving  the  a  posteriori  side  of  Theism.  We  proceed,  there- 
fore, to  a  critical  examination  of  the  Kantian  doctrine  of  finality. 

In  considering  the  question  which  has  been  given  as  the  second 
step  of  the  argument,  whether  we  can  infer  finality  from  order  and 
adaptation  observed,  Kant  seeks  to  show  that  finality  is  merely  a 
subjective  principle  of  the  reflective  judgment.  Its  origin  he  ex- 
plains substantially  as  follows :  *  The  Understanding  legislates 
a  priori  for  knowledge  of  Nature  as  an  object  of  sense.  The  Rea- 
son legislates  a  priori  for  the  causality  of  freedom  in  the  supersen- 
sible sphere.  But  the  supersensible  must  be  able  to  determine  the 
sensible  in  regard  to* the  causality  of  freedom,  because  the  effects 
must  take  place  in  the  sensible  world,  and  although  the  possibility 
of  this  cannot  be  comprehended,  it  must  be  presupposed.  The 
effect  in  accordance  with  the  concept  of  freedom  is  the  final  cause 
which  ought  to  result  in  the  natural  world,  hence  the  conditions  of 
its  resulting  are  presupposed  in  Nature.  The  Teleological  judg- 
ment does  this,  and  thus  bridges  the  gap  between  the  phenomenal 
and  noumenal  spheres.  Therefore,  it  is  a  necessary  judgment. 
But  what  is  its  nature  ?  Judgment  in  general  is  the  faculty  of 
thinking  the  particular  as  contained  in  the  universal.  Now,  if  this 
universal  be  a  necessary  concept  which  renders  experience  possible, 
as  do  the  categories  of  the  Understanding,  then  the  judgment  is 
called  a  determinant  one.  But  if  we  have  only  a  particular  empiri- 
cal law,  and  try  to  find  the  concept  for  it,  then  the  judgment  which 
makes  the  subsumption  is  called  a  reflective  judgment.  Such  a 
judgment  cannot  borrow  its  principle  from  experience,  for  it  is 
seeking  a  necessary  principle ;  nor  can  it  get  it  from  the  Understand- 
ing, for  then  it  would  be  a  determinant  judgment ;  therefore  the  fac- 
ulty of  judgment  must  itself  supply  this  principle  a  priori.  The 
principle  is  this.  For  reflection  on  Nature,  if  this  is  to  be  possible, 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Judgment,  translation  by  Bernard,  Introduction  and 
Division  2. 


40 

the  same  a  priori  certainty  must  be  conceived  to  be  in  the  particu- 
lar laws  of  nature  as  in  the  universal  ones.  They  must  be  consid- 
ered as  if  they  proceeded  from  an  Understanding,  though  not  our 
own,  so  as  to  render  possible  a  system  of  experience  embracing  the 
whole  of  nature ;  in  short,  nature  must  be  conceived  as  purposive. 
Here  are  Kant's  own  words  :*  "  As  universal  laws  of  nature  have 
their  ground  in  our  understanding  which  prescribes  them  to  nature, 
although  only  according  to  the  universal  concept  of  it  as  nature  ;  so 
particular  empirical  laws,  in  respect  of  what  is  in  them  left  unde- 
termined by  these  universal  laws,  must  be  considered  in  accordance 
with  such  a  unity  as  they  would  have  if  an  Understanding,  though 
not  our  Understanding,  had  furnished  them  to  our  cognitive  facul- 
ties so  as  to  make  possible  a  system  of  experience  according  to  par- 
ticular laws  of  nature.  Not  as  if  in  this  way,  such  an  Understand- 
ing must  be  assumed  as  actual,  for  it  is  only  our  reflective  judgment 
to  which  this  Idea  serves  as  a  principle,  for  reflecting,  not  for  deter- 
mining; but  this  faculty  thus  gives  a  law  only  to  itself  and  not  to 
nature."  This  concept,  then,  is  only  necessary  for  our  understand- 
ing ;  and  whether  or  not  it  is  true  objectively  we  cannot  say,  because 
it  arises  from  the  peculiarity  of  our  understanding.  It  is  the  pecu- 
liarity of  the  human  Understanding,  says  Kant,  that  it  is  discursive, 
that  it  proceeds  from  universals  to  particulars.  But  as  these  are 
undetermined  by  the  universal  concept,  in  order  that  they  may  be 
subsumed  under  it  Reason  demands  that  they  be  conceived  as  pur- 
posive. But  Kant  goes  on  to  say  that  we  must  recognize  the  possi- 
bility of  an  Understanding  which  is  intuitive  and  not  discursive. 
Such  an  Understanding  would  intuite  the  whole  and  its  parts  in  one 
act,  so  that  there  would  be  no  necessity  for  any  distinction  between 
final  and  efficient  causes,  but  the  whole  could  contain  the  possibility 
of  the  parts,  and  itself  be  merely  the  result  of  them  as  causes ;  but 
in  accordance  with  the  peculiarity  of  our  Understanding  the  whole 
must  be  considered  the  result  of  the  parts,  and  it  is  impossible  that 
it  should  contain  the  ground  of  the  possibility  of  the  parts,  so  that 
the  idea  of  the  whole  must  contain  the  possibility  of  the  form  and 
adjustment  of  the  parts,  and  this  idea  of  the  whole  is  a  purpose. 
So  Kant  concludes  that  finality  is  merely  a  concept  necessary  for 
our  minds.  This  constitutes  the  nerve  of  his  objection  to  the 
Teleological  argument ;  for  when  we  come  to  consider  the  two  criti- 
cisms which  he  makes  on  the  third  step  of  the  argument,  that  of 
the  inference  to  an  Intelligent  Cause  of  finality,  we  will  find  that 
this  same  doctrine  of  subjective  finality  is  repeated,  and  that  it  is 
the  only  one  of  the  two  criticisms  which  could  have  any  weight. 
So  that  this  second  point  being  established,  the  Theist  would  have 

*  Kant,  Critique  of  Judgment,  translated  by  Bernard,  Introduction,  \  4. 


41 

gained  his  point  as  far  as  Kant  is  concerned.  Of  course,  in  a 
treatise  on  Theism  the  doctrines  of  Hegel,  Schopenhauer,  and  von 
Hartmann  would  also  have  to  be  considered. 

Kant's  doctrine  of  finality  is  open  to  the  following  objections : 
In  the  first  place  the  deduction  of  the  principle  of  finality  in 
nature  from  a  necessity  of  connecting  nature  and  freedom  is  a 
mistake.  This  is  taking  finality  in  its  a  priori  and  spiritual  signifi- 
cance as  referring  to  ultimate  moral  ends,  and  trying  to  introduce, 
or  rather  force,  it  into  the  sphere  of  observation  and  natural 
phenomena.  This  highest  category  of  Reason  has  its  proper  place 
as  we  have  seen,  but  not  in  the  a  posteriori  argument  from  final 
causes.  The  concept  of  finality  in  nature,  that  is  the  finality 
inferred  from  the  adaptations  of  means  to  ends  in  nature,  cannot  be 
deduced  a  priori  from  the  concepts  of  morality.  Any  attempt  to 
derive  one  of  these  teleological  concepts  from  the  other  must  lead 
to  confusion,  and  it  has  led  Kant  into  an  unfair  criticism  of  the 
a  posteriori  argument  in  question,  because,  having  deduced  the 
principle  a  priori,  the  argument  would  have  to  presuppose  a  knowl- 
edge of  ultimate  ends  in  the  spiritual  sphere.  But  this  argument 
does  not  presuppose  any  knowledge  of  these,  and  is  grounded 
entirely  on  observation,  inference,  and  probability;  so  that  Kant's 
criticism  of  it  because  of  our  ignorance  of  ultimate  ends  is  ground- 
less and  arises  from  the  confusion  pointed  out.  In  the  second  place, 
his  doctrine  of  the  subjective  origin  of  finality  is  open  to  criticism. 
We  have  seen  how  he  sought  a  more  specific  origin  of  this  princi- 
ple than  the  one  just  mentioned.  The  principle  is  a  rational  ten- 
dency due  to  the  peculiar  nature  of  our  understanding,  which  is 
discursive  and  not  being  able  to  intuite  the  whole  and  its  parts 
must  use  this  principle  in  the  subsumption  of  particulars  under 
universals.  Now,  of  course,  if  the  principle  of  finality  in  nature 
were  a  priori  in  the  same  sense  as  is  that  of  causality,  that  of  con- 
ditioning experience,  then  it  would  be  objective ;  but  this  we  con- 
cede to  Kant  is  not  the  case.  But  we  deny  his  statement  that 
experience  cannot  prove  it,  and  believe  that  he  is  wrong  in  making 
it  merely  a  rational  tendency.  If  by  experience  he  mean  direct 
observation,  then  this  does  not  give  the  principle  ;  but  it  is  an  infer- 
ence from  this  with  all  the  weight  of  probability  upon  probability 
until  it  almost  reaches  necessity  and  certainty.  Finality  is  forced 
upon  us  by  our  observation  of  nature.  It  is  a  demand  of  Reason 
upon  occasion  of  experience  and  therefore  objective.  Says  Dr. 
Patton,*  "If  we  were  under  the  necessity  of  seeing  finality  in 
everything,  then  subjective  finality  would  be  the  best  guarantee  of 
objective  finality.  It  would  be  an  a  priori  truth.  But  there  is  no 

*  Patton,  Syllabus  of  Lectures  on  Theism. 


42 

such  subjective  necessity.  And  since  we  see  finality  in  some  things 
and  not  in  others  there  must  be  some  objective  ground  for  this  dis- 
tinction." Trendelenburg  also  shows  a  contradiction  at  this  point 
of  Kant's  argument.  Here  is -his  view,  as  summarized  by  Janet  :* 
"  If  finality  were  a  necessary  form  of  our  knowledge,  as  space  and 
time  are  necessary  forms  of  our  sense  intuition,  all  things  would 
appear  to  us  in  the  relation  of  means  to  ends.  But  no,  according  to 
Kant,  the  help  of  finality  is  called  in  when  the  explanation  by  efficient 
causes  no  longer  suffices ;  it  is  the  object  itself  which  forces  the  mind 
to  quit  the  road  it  was  following.  It  is  then  the  object  which 
determines  when  we  must  apply  the  purely  subjective  principle  of 
finality."  The  demand  for  this  principle  is  occasioned  by  observa- 
tion of  nature.  It  is  true,  as  Kant  says,  that  our  minds  being  con- 
stituted as  they  are  we  must  conceive  nature  thus.  But  this  is  not 
a  sufficient  guarantee  of  its  subjectivity.  The  assertion  that  it  is,  is 
merely  his  assertion  of  the  relativity  of  knowledge,  which  postu- 
lates without  grounds  the  existence  of  a  reality  which  is  not  the 
object  of  consciousness.  Knowledge  implies  a  knowing  mind,  it  is 
the  mind's  grasp  of  objective  truth.  We  cannot  say  then,  that 
because  it  requires  a  mind  to  know,  knowledge  is  subjective.  The 
knot  of  the  question  is  whether  or  not  there  is  any  connection 
between  our  minds  and  their  principles  of  knowledge,  and  Universal 
Reason  which  is  the  ground  of  all  things.  If  we  deny  this  connec- 
tion, absolute  skepticism  must  be  the  result.  This  objection  of 
Kant  to  finality  on  the  ground  of  its  subjectivity  finds  its  strongest 
answer  in  a  criticism  of  his  theory  of  knowledge.  We  conclude, 
then,  that  finality  is  an  objective  fact  which  demands  our  acceptation 
and  calls  for  explanation. 

With  reference  to  the  third  step  of  the  Teleological  argument  as 
stated,  Kant's  criticism  is  twofold. 

The  first  one  is  this:  f  After  criticising  the  doctrines  of  Epicurus, 
Spinoza,  and  of  Hylozoism,  he  says  of  Theism  that,  while  it  is 
the  best  of  all  systems  because  it  ascribes  the  purposes  of  nature  to 
Intelligence,  it  nevertheless  does  not  establish  its  claims,  because  it 
rests  its  inference  on  the  basis  of  finality,  which  has  been  shown  to 
be  only  a  subjective  principle.  The  second  criticism,  given  in  the 
section  entitled  "  Physico-Theology,"  is  this :  :f  However  far  Phys- 
ico-Theology  be  pushed,  it  can  never  disclose  the  ultimate  purpose 
of  creation,  because  it  does  not  extend  its  inquiries  beyond  expe- 
rience. It  is  based  on  inquiries  into  the  purpose  for  which  nature 
exists,  and  on  this  the  concept  of  a  Supreme  Intelligence  rests.  Our 

*  Janet,  Final  Causes. 

\  Kant,  Critique  of  Judgment,  Bernard's  translation,  §  73. 

I  Kant,  Critique  of  Judgment,  %  85. 


43 

ignorance  of  this  ultimate  purpose  prevents  us  from  inferring  an 
Intelligent  Cause  of  finality. 

The  first  objection,  that  finality  is  merely  a  subjective  principle, 
has  been  already  dealt  with  ;  and  we  have  seen  that  finality  is  a  real 
truth  to  be  explained,  and,  as  Kant  says,  granting  this,  Theism 
seems  a  more  reasonable  theory  than  those  of  Epicurus  and  Spinoza 
and,  we  may  add,  than  that  of  Ilegel. 

The  second  criticism  was  that  the  argument  presupposed  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  ultimate  end  for  which  nature  was  created ;  and  that  our 
ignorance  of  this  vitiates  the  argument,  since  from  the  knowledge 
of  contingent  ends  in  nature  we  cannot  infer  an  Infinite  Intelligence. 
With  reference  to  this,  it  may  be  said  that  this  a  posteriori  argu- 
ment does  not  seek  to  infer  Infinite  Intelligence,  but  only  to  show 
that  the  First  Cause  is  possessed  of  intelligence.  It  therefore  does 
not  presuppose  any  knowledge  of  ultimate  ends ;  but  from  the  won- 
derful adaptation  of  means  to  ends  in  nature,  the  mind  concludes 
that  the  cause  of  all  this  must  have  been  an  intelligent  cause. 
When  this  is  done  this  argument  has  performed  its  special  function. 
This  last  criticism  is  irrelevant,  because  it  requires  the  argument  to 
prove  too  much. 

As  long  as  men  continue  to  seek  adequate  reasons  for  the  phe- 
nomena about  them  this  argument  will  continue  to  have  weight,  in 
spite  of  the  subtle  criticisms  of  philosophers.  Men  never  can  be 
made  to  believe  that  this  vast  and  wonderful  cosmos  resulted  from 
chance  or  that  mechanical  law  is  self-explanatory.  Neither  will 
they  believe  that  it  resulted  from  the  evolution  of  an  immanent 
principle  which  reaches  self- consciousness  only  in  man,  and  so  can- 
not be  "external  to  anything;"  no  more  will  they  believe  that 
their  firm  conviction  is  a  mere  vagary  resulting  from  the  peculiarity 
of  their  mind.  The  belief  will  always  exist  that  Conscious  Intelli- 
gence is  at  the  beginning  of  things  as  well  as  that  it  is  their  ground, 
immanent  in  nature  and  man,  yet  external  to  both.  The  supernat- 
ural can  never  be  reduced  merely  to  the  spiritual. 

The  conclusion  from  all  this  would  seem  to  be  that  the  position 
reached  a  priori  is  confirmed  by  a,  posteriori  considerations.  That 
we  get  a  true  view  of  reality,  no  matter  which  of  the  two  stand- 
points we  take.  That  they  thus  agree  is  strong  evidence  of  the 
truth  of  each. 

To  leave  the  consideration  of  any  aspect  of  Kantism  without 
including  the  results  of  the  Metaphysics  of  Ethics  and  the  Critique 
of  the  Practical  Reason  would  be  unjust  and  would  give  no  ade- 
quate conception  of  his  system.  In  an  age  when  the  commands  of 
duty  had  been  reduced  to  maxims  of  prudence  or  of  inclination,  he 
raised  his  voice  more  powerfully  than  any  other  to  show  the  sacred- 


rTTT 


44 

ness  of  duty  ;  for  in  spite  of  the  Utilitarian  way  in  which  his  cate- 
gorical imperative  voices  itself,  this  is  given  as  a  test  rather  than  a 
ground  of  Eightness,  the  ground  being  found  in.  man's  noumenal 
nature,  which  connects  him  through  freedom  to  Eeason  Univer- 
sal. The  autonomy  of  the  will  is  the  basis  of  his  Ethics,  and  is 
open  to  severe  criticism  ;  but  he  certainly  did  uphold  duty  as  against 
a  calculating  morality.  And  furthermore  he  showed  the  necessity 
of  a  Metaphysical  basis  for  Ethics.  We  will  have  to  consider,  then, 
very  briefly,  his  Ethical  teaching,  and  here  of  course  only  so  far  as 
it  bears  directly  on  Theism. 

The  relation  of  Theism  and  Ethics  he  conceived,  we  believe, 
inadequately.  The  true  relation  between  them,  or  the  moral  argu- 
ment for  Theism  is,  briefly,  this.  The  three  fundamental  categories 
of  Ethics  are  Moral  obligation,  the  Eight,  and  the  Good.  Our  con- 
sciousness tells  us  that  we  are  under  an  unconditional  obligation  to 
conform  our  conduct  to  a  certain  standard  of  Eightness  and  to  real- 
ize a  certain  end  or  summum  bonum.  This  is  all  that  our  moral 
consciousness  tells  us,  but  there  must  be  some  ultimate  metaphysical 
explanation  of  these  categories.  Beginning  with  the  fact  of  moral 
obligation,  we  see  that  to  give  this  any  empirical  deduction  would 
result  in  reducing  it  to  a  hypothetical  imperative  ;  and  to  make  the 
will  absolutely  and  unconditionally  legislative  for  itself  must  result 
either  in  a  philosophy  of  caprice  which  would  explain  away  the 
categorical  imperative,  or  else  in  the  Ethical  Pantheism  of  Fichte. 
The  only  adequate  explanation  of  the  categorical  imperative,  there- 
fore, is  one  which  distinctly  separates  the  Absolute  and  Eelative 
wills ;  regarding  moral  obligation  as  the  Will  of  God  binding  His 
creatures  to  Eight,  which  must  consequently  be  explained  as  His 
nature,  and  to  realize  the  good,  which  must  embrace  human  well- 
being  or  perfection  and  happiness,  and  God's  glory.  That  the 
Absolute  must  be  possessed  of  moral  attributes  is  thus  the  testimony 
of  moral  phenomena.  Let'  us  now  examine  Kant's  doctrine  of  the 
relation  of  Theism  and  Ethics.  He  lays  down  what  he  believes  to 
be  the  two  great  foundations  of  Ethics  in  his  Metaphysics  of  Ethics. 
He  tells  us*  that  from  experience  we  can  never  tell  of  an  action 
whether  it  is  objectively  right  only,  or  whether  it  is  also  subjec- 
tively right,  that  is,  done  merely  out  of  respect  for  the  moral  law  ; 
but  that  we  conclude  that  whether  or  not  there  are  actions  of  this 
latter  kind  cannot  be  the  question,  and  that  Eeason  itself,  independ- 
ent of  all  experience,  tells  us  what  ought  to  take  place,  and  that 
this  imperative  is  categorical.  This  imperative,  being  a  fact  of  con- 
sciousness, must  have  some  explanation  which  will  render  it  possi- 
ble. He  lays  down  the  principle  of  the  autonomy  of  the  will  as 

*  Kant,  MetapJiysics  of  Ethm,  Abbot's  translation.  Preface,  §  2, 


45 

the  ground  and  explanation  of  the  moral  law.  The  will  must 
legislate  for  itself  by  an  a  priori  maxim,  because  all  heteronomous 
theories  are  inadequate,  empirical  principles  being  unable  to  give  a 
categorical  imperative,  and  the  rational  principle  of  perfection  being 
too  indefinite,  while  the  theological  view  of  connecting  the  moral 
law  with  God  would  necessitate  an  "  intuition  of  the  Divine  Perfec- 
tion" which  we  cannot  have.  So  he  concludes  that  the  moral  law 
in  our  consciousness  is  the  "ratio  cognoscendi"  of  freedom,  while 
freedom  is  the  "  ratio  essendi  "  of  the  moral  law.  This  being  the 
case,  we  expect  some  superficial  conception  of  the  connection  of  God 
and  Morality.  It  is  found  in  the  consideration  of  the  summum 
bonum.  This  is  the  material  category  of  Ethics,  and  Kant  shows  * 
that  it  must  include  happiness  as  well  as  virtue, — "  worthiness  to  be 
happy."  It  is  here  that  the  existence  of  God  can  be  shown.  Kant 
gives  this  in  substance  as  follows :  f  Man  ought  not  to  seek  happi- 
ness, but  he  ought  to  realize  it.  But  happiness  is  the  harmony  of 
all  physical  nature  with  one's  end.  Now  the  acting,  rational  being 
is  not  the  cause  of  nature,  and  there  is  no  necessary  connection 
between  virtue  and  happiness.  Therefore  the  supposition  of  a 
supreme  Moral  Cause  of  nature,  a  Holy  "Will,  is  necessary  in  order 
to  connect  necessarily  the  two  elements  of  the  summum  bonum.  We 
must  therefore  predicate  moral  attributes  of  God.  Thus  the  moral 
law  leads  through  the  conception  of  the  summum  bonum  to  relig- 
ion. The  moral  laws  are  recognized  as  Divine  commands,  not  in 
the  sense  that  they  are  right  because  God  wills  them,  but  because 
He  is  holy,  and  His  will  is  in  accordance  with  them. 

Now  in  the  first  place,  God  stands  in  such  a  doctrine  in  too  exter- 
nal and  superficial  a  relation  to  Ethics.  He  is  brought  in  merely 
in  order  to  get  over  a  difficulty  in  harmonizing  the  elements  of  the 
summum  bonum.  The  categories  of  Moral  obligation  and  Bight- 
ness  can  be  explained  without  Him.  This  leaves  us  with  a  theory 
of  freedom  which  is  caprice,  and  instead  of  explaining  moral  obli- 
gation explains  it  away.  On  the  contrary  we  know  that  the 
imperative  speaks  to  us  with  all  the  constraint  of  an  Absolute  Will 
commanding  our  own,  and  cannot  be  explained  as  our  noumenal 
self  determining  our  phenomenal  self.  God,  with  Kant,  becomes 
the  moral  governor  because  He  has  a  holy  will  which  perfectly 
obeys  this  principle  of  Kightness  which  is  external  to  and  above 
Him.  All  this  difficulty  arises  because  Kant  thinks  that  if  we 
explained  the  moral  law  by  God's  will  it  would  make  it  arbitrary. 
He  does  not  seem  to  see  another  alternative,  that  God's  will  and 
nature  cannot  be  in  opposition.  God  must  will  these  laws  because 

*  Kant,  Critique  of  Practical  Reason,  Bk.  ii,  chap.  ii. 

f  Kant,  Critique  of  Practical  Reason,  Abbot's  translation,  Bk.  ii,  chap,  ii,  §  5. 


46 

they  are  the  expression  of  His  nature.  It  is  the  fact  of  the  deter- 
minism of  the  divine  will  which  makes  a  necessity  of  the  Christian 
Mystery  in  the  Incarnation  and  Atonement.  Surely  as  far  as  arbi- 
trariness is  concerned  nothing  could  be  more  so  than  Kant's  theory. 
It  is  just  because  God  is  the  ratio  essendi  of  all  the  ethical  catego- 
ries that  we  ascribe  to  Him  a  moral  nature.  The  objection  that 
we  can  have  no  "  intuition  of  the  divine  perfection  "  could  be  urged 
only  if  God  were  entirely  different  from  us  arid  out  of  all  relation 
to  us.  But  it  has  been  seen  that  the  Self-revealing  Spirit  which  a 
true  Metaphysics  gives  us,  can  be  like  us  because  we  have  been 
formed  in  His  image.  It  is  this  truth  that  makes  all  knowledge 
possible,  and  Agnosticism  must  be  the  result  of  denying  it.  In 
order  to  know  nature,  we  must  determine  our  series  of  states  of  con- 
sciousness in  time  in  relation  to  a  relating  and  unifying  self- con- 
sciousness which  cannot  be  part  of  the  series  ;  and  this  in  turn  must 
be  a  true  copy  of  that  self-consciousness  which  makes  nature  possi- 
ble. If  then  our  noumenal  self  carry  with  it  a  moral  ideal  so  must 
God  also  be  conceived  as  possessed  of  moral  attributes. 

But  even  passing  any  defects  in  Kant's  theory,  we  may  ask,  Upon 
what  does  it  all  rest?  What  is  his  ground  for  asserting  that  the 
Practical  Reason  opens  up  the  noumenal  sphere  ?  Kant  says*  that 
it  is  not  opened  to  knowledge.  Freedom,  God  and  Immortality  are 
not  matters  of  knowledge  but  only  deducible  from  the  Moral  law, 
which  is  the  one  point  where  the  noumenal  world  enters  our  con- 
sciousness. But  we  may  well  ask  what  special  right  it  has  to  this 
unique  position.  Examination  of  consciousness  will  show  us  that 
the  necessity  accompanying  our  theoretical  principles  is  just  as  strong 
and  true,  just  as  universal.  It  would  seem,  then,  that  we  must 
admit  the  validity  of  our  theoretical  principles  in  the  noumenal 
sphere,  or  else  become  agnostic  in  Ethics  also.  Kant's  position  is 
not  logical.  He  is  not  logically  constructive.  Yet  through  all, 
this  was  his  aim,  this  was  the  spirit  of  his  whole  system. 

The  ruling  categories  of  eighteenth-century  thought  were  those 
of  individualism,  mechanism,  and  sensationalism.  These  had  such 
a  hold  on  the  human  mind  that  it  seemed  as  if  Philosophy  was  to 
be  forever  impossible.  Knowledge  must  be  explained  mechanically 
and  sensationally,  or  its  possibility  denied.  Morality  must  be 
reduced  to  physical  necessity,  or  at  best  to  a  calculus  of  prudence. 
Religion  was  an  empty  name.  Kant  lived  and  thought  just  at  this 
time.  He  gives  noble  expression  to  the  power  and  worth  of  the 
human  spirit.  He  illumines  everything  with  the  light  of  self-con- 
sciousness. He  brings  out  the  a  priori  elements  in  knowledge.  He 
places  morality  above  prudence.  He  causes  the  great  movement 

*Kant,  Critique  of  Practical  Reason,  Preface. 


47 

of  German  Idealism.  In  short  he  makes  possible  the  whole  intel- 
lectual life  of  the  nineteenth  century.  He  rises,  an  intellectual 
giant,  tearing  himself  from  the  fetters  of  the  preceding  thought ; 
and  though  he  is  held  back  half  chained,  as  it  were,  by  the  very 
bonds  whose  power  he  fought  so  nobly  to  break,  and  did  break,  yet 
the  first  step  was  the  hardest  to  take,  and  he  must  be  classed  with 
the  world's  great  thinkers  whose  influence  has  been  positive  and 
constructive.  He  will  always  be,  as  Dr.  Stirling  says,  "  der  ehrliche 
Kant." 

PRINCETON.  •  :^.:WfoTAR:"HpI)GE,  JR. 


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